Everlark
by WeAreJorus
Summary: **COMPLETE** There were so many things I'd wanted to tell him. Things I'd owed him for, time and again, that I wouldn't be able to say. And as my eyes began to close for the last time, I thought them as hard as I could, but one thought rose above the rest. 'I love you, Peeta Mellark.'
1. Prologue

**Hello, readers. By stumbling across this story, you've submitted to embarking on what I hope will be a deep, delicious adventure. Be warned, this is not your typical Peeta/Katniss lemonfluff fest, a fact I hope many of you will find refreshing. Characters don't deviate from canon, and this is not an alternate universe. It's just a supposition of things that may have happened after the end of Mockingjay and before the Epilogue. Reviews are encouraged and always appreciated. Enjoy the ride.**

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**Prologue**

~ Katniss ~

Time is a peculiar thing. It heals the skin, though marks are left behind. It heals the mind, though that's pretty marked too. It's not to be rushed, and if time wants to, it can bring you right back to the beginning again.

That pretty much sums up how I'm dealing with my sister. Yeah, I'm thinking about her again. It took a long time, but the triggers and sparks that brought her death screaming to the forefront of my mind were sharp and brutally unendurable. The only way to dull them was to bring them forth myself, to take them all in and sit on them awhile.

So day after nightmare she came with me. Was always with me. I sang to her when the sun rose. I made Sae put down an extra plate at the kitchen table for breakfast, and I ate from both. I fed and fussed over Buttercup. She would have liked that. I sat in her room, arranged her dolls and thumbed through her books. Her hairbrush loosened my braid before bed.

I even talked to her sometimes, in private. It didn't stop the tears, no those were always waiting for their moment. But after a while, though I didn't miss her any less, she didn't overwhelm me so much. Time does that.

Haymitch thought I was crazy. No disagreement there. Sae thought I was a miser for punishment. None there either. I don't know what Peeta thought. He was taking it all in, too.

I'd only seen a few of his remnant tremors firsthand. They came on without warning, at least none the rest of us could see. They usually involved him getting really quiet, holding onto something, and violently shaking or sitting down to rock himself. He'd told me once that if he concentrated long and hard enough, he could actually change something he was seeing, something small and insignificant, but something that would stay the way he'd changed it, and then he'd know that it wasn't real. It took a lot of concentration and shaking to make it happen, and so we called them tremors.

I could tell he hated when I was there to watch, and even more if I tried to help. He'd curl up and ride it out, and more than half the time he'd brush it off like it was nothing, even smiling shyly at me. But I'd see him later, when he thought no one was looking. I know they took a toll on him.

Our bedroom windows faced each other, and so he always knew when I was having a nightmare, and I knew when he was too afraid to sleep. After we each got over our lingering stubbornness (mine lasted longer than his, of course) one of us would venture next door to help the other to sleep. Just like on the train before the Quarter Quell. That's all it was.

After about a year, I had an epiphany while counting the scars on my left arm. I marched into Prim's room, packed up everything that had been hers, save a few little trinkets, and carted them down to the Hob, not selling off her belongings so much as giving them new homes, and to the people who had known her best. Then I did something completely out of character, but it actually felt really... well, not good, but right. It felt right. I moved Peeta and his paintings into his new art studio, down the hall from my bedroom.

And he's lived in my home ever since. Our home. Our routines. Our... life.


	2. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1**

~ Peeta ~

Two years passed together. It didn't seem that long sometimes, and others, it felt like I'd finished one lifetime and started on a second. Some days were eventful, most were not. Recovery is like that. It's not to say that the uneventful days were pleasant (or that the eventful days weren't), as my thoughts often drifted of their own accord to the realm of painful, terrible fiction. And when I say painful, I mean it. But I'm dealing.

A light dusting of snow caught my eyelashes as I walked home from the bakery, but the air barely held a chill. Good thing too, I was hoping to make it home before these loaves cooled too much. Up ahead, I could just make out the second house from the left. Some of the lights were on, and a light smoke rose from the chimney. So she'd beaten me home after all.

"Katniss, I'm home," I called out over the creak of the front door. I made a mental note to add that bit of maintenance to my running laundry list.

The bread bag dropped to the kitchen counter as I folded my jacket over the back of a chair, and peripherally, I caught her slight form by the pantry door. "How was your day?"

_Click._ I looked up in time to watch her hand drop from the phone receiver. Her face was like stone.

"Katniss?"

A long moment's pause, and then she gulped. My stomach tightened; she did that every time she was in pain but intent on hiding it. I just stood there like a lump. Then, like I wasn't there at all, she walked evenly past me and out of the kitchen, her long braid tapping her back. Only her hastened footfalls as she ran up the stairs broke me from my stupor. A door slammed, and my gut twisted.

"Katniss?" I called after her, my cadence on the stairs far more distinct. Choked, broken sobs echoed from behind the washroom door. I stupidly tried the handle. Of course she locked it. I knocked softly.

"Please... are you okay?" Stupid question. I sighed at myself, sliding down the adjacent wall to sit on the floor, my heart thudding anxiously. Maybe I could hear her better from down here. "Just tell me if you're okay, Katniss," I asked. Sometimes she'd have a bad day. I wasn't the only one who had them, but hers were fewer and further between, and we always dealt with them together.

This was different though. It was bad, I could feel it. _Who was on the phone? And what did they say to her?_

"I'm... so-rry Peeta... I can't..." came her answer.

I heaved a sigh. "What can I do?"

A sniffling pause. "Just... go away."

"I can't do that," I told her. "But, I can be quiet. All right?"

I took her uneven breaths as an affirmative. This could be a long night.

It wasn't more than a few minutes like this before I heard two knocks at the front door. "I'll be right back," I told her.

Haymitch Abernathy hadn't changed much, except that his inebriation level had eased slightly, as had his wrecked appearance. Today though, he looked haggard as ever, red-rimmed eyes and all.

"Is she here?" He stepped inside.

"Yeah, something's got her all upset though." I closed the door behind him. "She locked herself in the bathroom and won't talk to me."

Haymitch sighed. "Her mom just called me, says they got disconnected. Wanted me to check on her," he sniffed.

"Oh." Well that answered the who. It's the what I was afraid to ask. "Did she say anything else?"

"Uh... yeah." The older man twisted an heirloom ring around his finger. "Gale was murdered this morning."

~ Katniss ~

It's been thought a thousand times, a trillion times a thousand times. Somewhere at the back of my mind, I'd known... hoped... wished... that I'd have a chance to say things to him... certain things I needed so say, that he needed to hear, and have my questions answered. Not questions I really wanted answers to, but that I... well, I won't ever get to. He's gone.

They said he was found in his room, a blow to the back of the head. They said his brother Rory found him during the night after he'd heard a muffled thud down the hall. They said there would be an investigation and an arrest made. They asked if I knew of anyone who would wish him harm. They said they'd keep me informed.

I didn't think this would hit me so hard. I wasn't expecting... you always think you have time. Someday I'd be just level enough to entertain the possibility of seeing him again, that the waves of painful memories would ebb enough to get me through such a meeting. You think the day will come, but the moment you realize something that was once permanent is gone, life becomes frightening. Uncontrollable. I wonder if this is how Peeta feels when the tremors hit him...

Peeta. I'd blocked him out, and he didn't deserve it... he never does. I'm a horrible person. He cried with me when I finally unlocked the door, though why, I can't fathom... except that anything that hurts me finds a way to hurt him as well. He was there, a hand resting supportively on my back, when I arrived in Two and met Hazelle at their home; Posy attached herself to my waist and wouldn't let go. Rory melted into the shadows and wouldn't talk to anyone. Peets stood back, watching, as I lay dandelions on the fresh grave.

It wasn't supposed to happen this way. I was supposed to know things, eventually. I didn't want to know, yet, I wanted, _needed_ to know. What really happened. And it wasn't just that. I did love him, right up till the end. Even still, regardless what transpired between us. He'd been family, was a brother. Now there were just ashes.

~ Peeta ~

In darkness, shiny things seem that much brighter. I should know. I mean this figuratively, of course. Periods of darkness feel less uncomfortable, if that makes any sense; there is no weeding through the portrayal of normalcy for signs of artifice. I don't have to guess so hard at what's real. And it's easier to avoid the tremors.

Katniss's slight form, her back toward me, silhouetted against the moonlight from the traincar window. The magnetic hum was so low that I could easily hear her breathing. They were uneven, her breaths, betraying her wakefulness. I lightly placed my warm hand on her back. It was all I could do, all she would let me do for her.

After a long moment she sighed and rolled over, hesitantly, to face me. Eyes exhausted and sleep-deprived, she read my expression, and her breath hitched in her throat.

Seeing her this way was torture. My hand moved to her side.

"What can I do?" I whispered.

She sighed and shook her head, but held my gaze. Her eyes were darker in the low light, but the moonbeams illuminated her hair. Even in sadness, she was a terribly beautiful creature.

And so I kissed her. My hand moved to touch her cheek, my mouth brushed hers softly. And when her chapped lips moved against mine, I knew I was still hers. She was still with me.

I pulled back a bit to gauge her reaction, and selfishly, to save myself the heartache of her pulling away first. I did tuck a stray lock of dark hair behind her ear, though. I couldn't bear to lose that small bit of contact I'd initiated.

And then, she finally spoke, slowly though, as if she were thinking it through as she went along.

"Peeta..." her voice was quiet, raspy. "I'm so... so sorry, for the distance I've put between us," she began. She sniffed, her breaths hitching lightly, echoes of the effects of so many tears. "You're so wonderful. The last few days would have been much harder without you."

I sighed, my eyes never leaving hers. Normally, I'd offer her a tiny smile in answer, but we were both so drained and the circumstance so miserable, I settled for placing a soft kiss on her forehead. I knew she'd accepted when her small hand found my cheek and settled there.

"Sleep, Katniss," I whispered. She closed her eyes and nodded, and moved to curl against my chest. I brought my arms around her and vowed to get some sleep as well. Twelve was a mere four hours away.

~ Katniss ~

Getting out of the house before dawn was a recurring theme. Honestly, I was tired of the glances of pity, of everyone walking on eggshells around me... and that look on Peeta's face. For years, since I began to accept that my feelings for him weren't a default of the Capitol's manipulations, I'd wondered how he felt about his 'place' with regards to Gale. Yes, I was forcing myself to think about Gale; trying _not _to think about him made the pain when I _did_ think about him more acute, and anyway, I'd have to think about him sooner or later. I wondered sometimes, during particular moments, whether he felt that I was with him only because Gale had... or hadn't... well, I would never know for sure. But I wondered, all the same, if Peeta questioned my motivation, that somehow I had 'settled' for him. Which isn't the case at all, it never was, even when Gale was a possibility. Which he wasn't... now I was just confusing myself. Anyway, the grass was greener on the other side of the meadow, so every day it called to me.

Miles of groundcover touched these boots. I didn't go anywhere in particular, and sometimes I'd end up in the same places or somewhere new entirely. My route was never planned. I just needed to move. To the fishing pond. And then sit, my back against a tree. And think. About everything. Everything, and nothing, and Peeta, and Gale, my mother, Sae, Haymitch Madge Finnick Cinna Rue... and Prim... and everything. And nothing.

_Katniss..._

I startled. I'd gotten so lost in my thoughts, the tree trunk at my back felt foreign for a long instant, the hairs on the back of my neck pricked. A light wind brushed the pond before me, wrinkling its mirrored surface, shifting the mist that had settled on the grass. No other sounds were evident. I finally released the breath I was holding. Must have been my imagination.

_Katniss..._

It was closer this time. My bow was armed in an instant and I was on my feet, panning the place where I stood, the tree to my back. Crouching, I sidestepped slowly around the trunk, peering into the mist.

The wind shifted again and the mist obeyed, silhouetting a form just beyond, where I couldn't quite see. My fingers were rigid on the bow, light on the arrow's tail. I could release in less than a breath if I had to.

"I see you," I say. "Show yourself."

If the wind ever had a mind to comply, it did at that moment. And I could never have prepared for who I saw.

He stood, uniformed, clean and well-fed, better than I'd ever seen him, even on Reaping Day, even in Thirteen. My voice was barely a whisper.

"Gale."

His full lips formed two short words, but the blood pounded in my ears and I didn't hear. I hadn't realized I'd fallen to my knees, the arrow pointed at the ground.

"No... Gale, you..." I started, but I couldn't bring forth anything more.

The form that was Gale took two deliberate steps and raised his voice to me, a thing he'd never done in life.

_"Avenge me."_

"Gale!" I blinked, but I was in darkness. A hardness was pressing into my back, the tree from a moment ago... but where was the mist? And where was...

I whipped around. There was a bit of moonlight coming through where the treetops were sparse, but nothing else. Just the sounds of the forest at night. I dropped my face in my hands and heaved a shuddering breath. I'd fallen asleep. Retrieving the sheath of arrows and my bow, I decided that being in the woods was probably not the best idea, especially at night, and I had a long walk ahead. And more thinking to do.


	3. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

~ Peeta ~

"Don't say it again, Haymitch."

Haymitch closed his mouth. I know he meant well, but having him predict that Katniss would be home 'any minute' several times an hour since the sun set five hours ago was actually making the situation feel more hopeless than... no, it was midnight, so it really was hopeless. She'd never stayed out more than a half hour past sunset. Ever. She knew better. That's when the predators came out. I couldn't even think...

Sae reached over from the chair next to mine, where she'd convinced me to settle since wearing a rut across the floor wouldn't help anything, and patted my arm soothingly. She'd already been to the Hob and a number of other places across town. Haymitch had phoned several of his contacts on the outskirts and at the mines, who would sweep the edge of the woods and call the second they caught wind of her wherabouts, and I had... I'd baked. And baked more. And cleaned. And fed Sae and Haymitch. And waited on the porch. And sat by the phone. And curled into a ball. And paced across the living room, the kitchen, up and down the hallway. I was useless and unworthy, and scared out of my mind.

I dropped my head in my hands, willing the tears not to fall. I hadn't been this scared in the Games, not even when I realized she'd drugged me to go retrieve the medicine. Not even when we were separated and I was taken prisoner. Not even when I endured the hallucinations that had her committing heinous atrocities. Those had all happened when she was controlled, determined, and powerful.

Now, I feared she may still be determined, but to commit an atrocity against herself. I had thought she was doing better. If only I'd...

There was a _'click' _in the kitchen. I don't remember how I got there, but she had barely closed the back door behind her when I took her arms and spun her around. My hands went to her face, her forehead, her shoulders, then slid around her back to hold her against me.

"Are you all right? Are you hurt?" I pulled back to examine her face. She looked exhausted and shaken, but just shook her head. I wrapped my arms around her again. "Oh thank goodness you're safe." My heart thudded an abnormal rhythm of sick relief, and tears stung my dry eyes as I breathed in the scent of her hair, felt her warm cheek against my face.

She brought her arms to rest around my waist and leaned into me a bit. "I'm sorry," she whispered.

I pulled back to kiss her forehead. "We'll talk about it later."

"Thanks for making an appearance, Sweetheart," Haymitch's voice carried from the front door. "We'll see you tomorrow."

"Thank you both," I called over my shoulder to them, and the front door closed heavily.

Katniss rubbed her face. "What time is it?" her voice cracked tiredly.

"After midnight," my voice had a tinge of harshness to it, both intended and not.

"Mmm..." she nodded. "I think I'll go to bed."

I still had ahold of her. "I think you should eat something first," I suggested, again a bit harshly.

She swallowed, then nodded. I sat her down at the kitchen table and warmed up a bowl of broth and toasted a piece of bread. I watched her eat; she did so quite a lot more slowly than usual. She wouldn't look at me.

"More?" I asked when she'd finished. She shook her head.

I nodded and took her dishes to the sink, turning on the water. I was so grateful that she was here, that she'd come home, that she was unhurt, but I was desperate for a way to reach her. To figure out what motivated her to stay out all day and part of the night. To make her understand that she shouldn't do that to me. Dishes clean, I shut the water off and leaned against the sink, hands still dripping.

"I saw Gale today." Her voice was just above a whisper, but even and clear. I believe my heart did stop, then sputter back to some kind of disjointed rhythm. I turned to face her.

"You... what?"

She gulped, then sighed. "I keep forgetting, it was so real... I dreamed, or... hallucinated... Gale snuck up on me in the woods. By the pond. He... asked me... he asked me to avenge him."

Her eyes didn't meet mine until after she'd finished. I imagine the look on my face was of confusion and disbelief, because hers was pleading, tears shining in her eyes and all.

Oh wonderful. Even in death, Gale Hawthorne had a way of mesmerising Katniss. It was never in my heart to lay blame, but I felt myself blaming him for the distance between Katniss and me. It wasn't right to do, and it wasn't fair to anyone. But it was how I felt.

Katniss shook her head suddenly. eyes back to the floor. "Silly, I know." She used the table to help her stand, obviously tired and weak. "Thanks for supper." At the doorway, she turned back to me. "I'm sorry I worried you," she told me quietly.

She treaded softly up the stairs, and I heard the water come on in the bathroom. I just stood there, slow and stupid as ever. My hands had started to dry and I finished them on my pants. I was still reeling from the lingering fear. And at the same time, I was grateful. Most importantly, that she was home, unharmed and safe, at least as unharmed as I could gather. And selfishly, that the fear of losing her was the only thing I had that consistently deterred the tremors. And lately, I'd been due for an earthquake.

She was already in bed when I came up. I leaned in the doorway; she'd left the light on and was on her side facing me, blinking sleepily. She patted the bed when I came in and I sat on the edge, reaching out to stroke her hair. And we stayed that way for a while.

"You're not coming to bed, are you," she said softly.

I looked down at the sheets, then shook my head, feeling the need to explain, but not wanting to give her fodder for discussion. "I'm going to stay downstairs tonight... I just don't feel well," I fibbed.

She sighed, then nodded. "I feel awful for scaring you like that," she said.

I offered her a tiny smile, but it was sad. "It's not about that," I fibbed again. "But please don't do that to me," I asked her, and she nodded. I leaned down to kiss her forehead. "Sleep now."

The trees played shadows against the wallpaper in the living room when I finally curled up on the couch in an attempt to spend the rest of the night in unconsciousness. She knew there was more than just 'not feeling well,' which was the best explanation I had that was not an outright lie. She just knew these things. If the tremors were going to come in the night, I wanted to be as far away from her as I could reasonably be. And I'd locked her bedroom door from the inside, for good measure.

~ Katniss ~

I dreamed of Prim. It wasn't a bad dream either, just left me with an overwhelming emptiness when I awoke. These nights were fewer, and sometimes I wished for the consistency of nightmares... but the way Peeta was last night, I'm glad I didn't wake screaming.

I dressed and went hunting for my jacket, finding it draped over the tub where I'd left it last night. The right sleeve had hung down in a residual puddle of water and was damp at the wrist. It was annoying, but wearable, and it would dry.

Peeta was still asleep when I came down, despite the sunlight streaming in. I cut a piece of bread from last night's loaf, a savory pumpkin nut creation that tasted better warm, but would do just fine. I stuffed the piece in my mouth and cut a second piece, wrapped it in cloth with a piece of cheese and put both in my bag. I looked longingly over at Peeta; I hated the thought of waking him, but to leave him to wake in an empty house after what I put him through last night would be an atrocious thing to do.

Face-down was such a peaceful position for him, arms on either side of his head, feet flopped over the arm of the couch. Children often slept this way. Prim usually did... _oh Prim. After last night's dream, you'll be with me all day, won't you? _I thought to myself. I sighed, and decided I would have to be okay with that. I ran my hand along Peeta's arm, up to his shoulder and whispered his name.

"Mmm..." he groaned, blinking into wakefulness.

"Morning," I said, trying to sound as soothingly cheerful as I could. He smiled at me and held onto my hand. "Any problems?"

He shook his head and yawned.

I nodded. "I'm going out for a while," I began. He looked suddenly apprehensive. "Just a few hours, I'll be back by lunch. I promise."

He seemed mildly reassured. "Okay," he whispered, stroking my arm.

I brought his hand to my lips and kissed his fingers. "Need anything while I'm out?"

He yawned again, turning onto his side and pointing toward the door, or rather, to the folded paper on the table next to the door. One of our routines, since I mostly went out alone and he rarely ventured out without me, was the passing of notes. Just little things, words of encouragement, things to remember, lists with notes in the margins. Little things, to remind us that we were a team. I retrieved the paper and looked it over, just a few things from the market. He gave a little wave from the couch, and I returned it with a small smile.

If you'd told me that this was going to be one of those eventful days, I'd totally have believed you. I just would have had a different train of thought entirely. This was not my first thought when I dove headfirst under the remainder of the dead wire fence, as I'd done almost every single day since I was eleven, but it was in the top three. First, was '_Oh good grief this hurts,_' as somehow, I didn't see the loose wire from the row above that had broken free and proceeded to snag my braid, wrenching my head back as my neck argued with the forward momentum of my body. My next thought, laced with profanity, concerned the fact that in this position, I couldn't move to reach the knife sheathed at my left ankle, and the more I moved, the more it hurt and the more trapped my hair became. My third thought played out, and if the annoying pain in my neck wasn't so, well... irritating, I might have had a good and sarcastic laugh at myself. Gale sure as heck would have been rolling on the ground laughing at me. I'm certain I looked ridiculous.

Okay, problem. The meadow was not exactly in the center of town. I could sit here on a busy day and not see anyone for a half hour or more. Well, I could sit here and ponder my predicament (and endure the now searing pain shooting down my neck and back), or I could start raising a fuss and get the embarrassment over with. I chose the latter, obviously, and was thankful I didn't have to wait long. I just wished I could see who'd heard me.

"Well now look what you've done to yourself," a distinctively male voice teased. "You'd think places where the fence was actually, oh I don't know... _gone_... would be a better way through?"

Thom. Of all people, someone Gale used to work with. I'd know that voice almost anywhere. Just my luck. My neck hurt too much to protest though. What was I going to say, '_Oh, not you. Send someone else to help me get unstuck?_'

"Hey Thom. Cut me free?" I tried to sound less pained, and I wasn't sure if I pulled it off.

"Surely."

He must have had his own blade, most of the former miners did, for emergencies, and now, out of habit. You never know when you might need a blade. And I was thankful for this, and then, thankful for the relief one swift stroke made. I scurried back under the fence, and was halfway to thanking him when I saw. I tried to keep my voice calm.

"Thom, I meant cut the wire... not my hair." More than a foot of my braid hung, badly entangled, from the fence, like a flag in the wind.

Thom shrugged. "It'll grow back won't it?" He patted my knee with finality and headed back toward town, leaving me to feel the back of my head. I'm glad I didn't have a mirror... It didn't take seeing one to know my hair, what was left of it, fell above my shoulders.

I ignored the amused looks I got in the market. It didn't matter, it was just hair. It didn't matter. Not that I hadn't cut it in years, not that Prim had brushed the ends of the hair that was now gone... no, it didn't matter. Prim didn't... wouldn't have wanted me to dwell, and so I didn't. Much.

I visited Sae at the Hob, and she made me sit a while so she could even out the ends. I figured it couldn't get any worse, so I let her. I heard her chuckle a few times. I suppose it was good to be the reason for others' delight for once. I was doing my civic duty, keeping the people happy. It was stupid to be vainly miserable about hair. It was just... hair. Cinna would have done something spectacularly understated and appropriate with it. Cinna... another person I missed dearly.

I put the hood of my jacket over my head coming up the front walk. An aroma of warm wheat and spices hit me from the front door, and I called out to him preemptively.

"Peeta, don't freak out okay?" I called.

"About what?" I heard from the kitchen. I paused in the doorway, he was taking bread out of the oven. I waited for him to finish, he was always so meticulous with his baking. Finally he clicked off the oven, chucked his oven mitts and turned to greet me.

"Don't freak out about what?"

I searched his face, so much more pleasant than last night, not a trace of worry left. I sighed and slowly dropped my hood. And then everything seemed to happen at once.

His eyes flashed, then went flat black, the color draining from his face. I stepped back, startled, as his breathing rose, teeth and fists clenching. Then the shaking started. My heart plummeted. This was no ordinary tremor. This was everything that had been done to him, reawakened, reset, hitting him full-force.

I backed out of the room to the front door again, and it was like something from one of those silly horror movies Haymitch dug up from the Capitol archives. As I turned the handle, Peeta, or rather, Un-Peeta, Capitol Peeta, Tortured Peeta rounded the corner in pursuit.

I tripped backward down the steps, grabbing the handrail for purchase and spinning around at the bottom to run, and run I did. I didn't have anywhere to run to, except two doors down and across the street. Kicking the scattering geese out of the way, I banged on Haymitch's door, hollering, but not soon enough. I was being knocked to the ground, hands clawing at my face, fingers struggling to get around my throat. I couldn't do anything but scream. My foot kicked out and sent a stray lantern flying.

_He might actually kill me this time_, I thought in a flash. He was muttering, hateful things I was sure, but either the strangulation or his rage muddled the actual words.

There were so many things I'd wanted to tell him. Things I'd owed him for, time and again, that I wouldn't be able to say. And as my eyes began to close, I thought them as hard as I could, but one thought rose above the rest.

_I love you, Peeta Mellark_.


	4. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

~ Haymitch ~

_Hey, I was asleep until those two started fighting on my porch. It was only a matter of time, damn birds getting out of their pen and honking all over my yard. Stupid feathers and crap all over the place, squawking. I oughta take them all out back and have a roast for dinner. Where's my other bottle, I left it around here somewhere. Where is... oh there it is. Ugh... tastes like crap. Why did the sun have to come up so early... I just fell asl... What the hell are they doing out there? Never heard a bunch of birds make that much noise in my..._

_CRASH._

_Okay, not birds. Can't be birds. _I was struggling to my feet, it took a minute to get my bearings, the pounding in my head a constant reminder that down was the direction I should probably have stayed. _Whoever's out there's gonna get an earful, then maybe something thrown at em. We'll see what kinda mood I'm in about a minute from now. Door handle's a little sticky, don't remember how it got that wa..._

The boy was in one of his rages, on my porch, on top of her and bringing all his weight down on her neck. _Dammit, I thought he was over this... _I peeled him off her, sometimes I surprised myself by my own strength. "What's wrong with you, boy?" I hollered at him. Then I saw, his eyes were black as I'd ever seen em, and after he stumbled back, he went after her again. So I decked him, right across the face. He went down hard. Then I turned to the girl.

"You okay, Sweethear... Oh no." She was out, I didn't know how out but she was out. Limp. I got down and tapped her face with my fingers, nothing. Kinda purple too. I felt... nope, no air... _Oh man I don't know how to do this..._

"Dammit!" I spun on the boy. "Don't you dare move!" I hollered. Kid had his head in his hands, rocking. Whatever it was, he was out of it.

_Phone, phone... where's the damn... oh there it is. _I jammed the plug in the wall, wasn't taking any chances with leftover bugs and Capitol eavesdropping tech. Some lady's voice came on.

"Abernathy... the Village... got a girl, can't breathe, need a medic. Get off it and get here now!" I slammed the receiver down, it kinda fell half off the cradle.

Rammed the door on the way back out, it swung out and hit the boy in the shins. _Serves him right at the least for what he done to her... aw dammit she's still not moving! _I didn't know what else to do, so I got down on the ground, took her by the shoulders and sat her up, pulled her against my chest and rocked her. "Sweetheart, you better not die on me, I didn't keep you alive out there for nothing!" I'm not sure if I felt her move, but then I wasn't sure of anything. "I swear I'll go easy on the 'shine from now on, but you gotta move or something. If you don't stick around I'm gonna kill that boy of yours."

Speaking of 'that boy', he was still backed into the corner of the porch rocking himself. I wished he'd whack his head on the railing and snap out of it already, I didn't have a clue what I was doing.

The medics took her from me. Put her on a sterile slab and stuck something in her mouth, had her chest moving real fast. Said she'd probably make it. Asking me what happened, told em I couldn't remember. Easy enough story when it's usually the truth. Besides, I was handling that boy myself. He stayed quiet, I don't even know if they saw him. They took the girl in a white truck, told me where to go. Then they were gone. I needed a drink real bad.

"Boy, you love that girl! What's wrong with you?" I turned on him.

Still rocking. I grabbed his arms and shook him good and hard. His weird eyes shrank and blew up and shrank again, kinda turned from black to blue. I was gonna turn him both in a sec if he didn't start talking. The side of his face was already blooming kinda purple where I decked him.

His eyes flickered back and forth, then trained on me. Face crumpled.

"I killed her!" he blurted out. "Haymitch I killed her!" Tears and snot ran down his face and the sobs, oh the sobs made my ears hurt. Then he collapsed on the ground, started squawling about something, sounded like he asked me to kill him.

I rolled my eyes. It was his stupid episodes that made me stay away most of the time. Sae calls me insensitive. _Hey, I did my part, I brought em home. Not my fault they got sent back again, not my fault the Capitol screwed him up. I just don't want to deal with this crap, but he ain't got anybody else._

"Kid, she's not dead," I said, like it was common knowledge. Of course he didn't hear me through all that bawling. I had to drag him up and make him look at me. "She's. Not. Dead."

He kinda half-stopped crying, kept heaving, and blinked at me.

"Now stop-" I rapped him hard on both shoulders on the word- "your blathering and tell me what the hell happened."

"She's... I didn't..." he looked around, bewildered. I wondered for a sec if I ever looked like this. Must be almost funny to watch me when I'm confused.

"Sentences," I egged him on. "Sentences are good."

"But where..." he started looking for her, all frantic.

"The medics took her. Said she'd probably be ok..."

"_Probably?_"

"Yes, probably! Now tell me what the fark happened to make you go off like that you little twit or I'll drag you down to the Justice Center and have you locked up." I wasn't kidding. Well, mostly.

He sniffed. I handed him the hankie from my back pocket and he wiped his face on it. Don't think it was used, didn't really give a hoot.

"Start talking."

~ Peeta ~

I remember everything.

Every. Single. Detail. Flooded into my brain like that wave on the beach. My plan for her safety had backfired. And it was my fault.

My sweet Katniss would never forgive me.

I'd never forgive myself.

My nose was running. I wiped it again, not quite focusing properly. The cloth smelled musty... and like smoke. "Her hair..."

Haymitch rolled his eyes. "Complete sen-ten-ces," He articulated.

I tried again. "She cut her hair."

He rolled his eyes again. "Yeah, she's a girl. They do that sometimes. No reason to choke her to death."

I gave him one of the meanest looks I'd probably ever issued. He choked back a laugh, but I continued. "It wasn't supposed to happen," I insisted. "Sh- she came in, and I wasn't seeing her, I was seeing... I'd made her look like that."

Haymitch sat back against the doorjamb and ran a hand over his hair. "You're gonna have to make sense at some point."

I heaved a shuddered, post-crying breath, looking around like the answers were going to be written in the wood grains of the porch railings. I finally looked him dead in the face. "The... episodes... the effects from what they did to me. When I try really hard, I can change things while one is happening... little things... so I can tell what's true and what's not. I knew... well, I thought I knew... that Katniss would never cut her hair, so I made the hallucination of her have short hair... so I'd know the difference," I strung along brokenly. "When she walked in..." my voice cracked, remembering her drop her hood, and her eyes... her beautiful gray eyes turned blood-red, and became the monster from my nightmares. The one who took the Capitol's drugs and manipulations willingly, who delighted in making me suffer, who hurt herself deliberately and forced me to watch. The one who said she'd given the order that dropped bombs on the town, burning my family alive. The one who had seduced me, made me believe she was carrying my child, then rid herself of it intentionally. I felt bile churning in my stomach. My face crumpled and I couldn't finish.

Haymitch looked a little stunned, and a lot sober. "Sorry kid, I didn't know."

I had to hold my breath in short spurts to keep the sobs from pouring out. "Hay-mitch, you- have to- see- that she's- all- right," I pleaded.

He sighed and got to his feet, then dragged me up by the arm. "Yeah, and I'm not going by myself."

~ Katniss ~

The tubes that send us into the arena are claustrophobic at first. Then, all you can think about is what's around you, what you're in for, and you're glad to have that glass wall between you and the twenty-two other tributes that might end your life at the end of the countdown.

But this arena wasn't from before. The air looked like ashy greenish smoke, stagnant, thick and unforgiving. The other tubes... I could hardly see them. Then my tube started to open. It wasn't smoke.

It was water.

I was being held down to the plate by my feet, it must release when the timer hit zero. I hoped.

_"Thirty eight... Thirty seven..."_

What was I doing here again? Wasn't I done with this? I could barely make out the other tributes, struggling, panicking. But if I'm here, where's... Peeta. And it hit me, he can't swim. Not well enough to escape this.

"Twenty... Nineteen..."

I willed myself to keep calm. The only District that would really be a threat at this point is Four, and chances were they'd have their hands full with the others. I had to get some air and then find Peeta before they did.

"Two... One."

My feet released, and I kicked my way upward, my lungs already straining. The surface was ahead, and I rocketed up, headfirst, ready to take a breath. And my head hit a wall.

I'd already started to take a breath preemptively. Now my lungs were spasming to expel the thick fluid, and screaming to draw in air that wasn't there. My hands thrown above me, hit a clear barrier that was the only thing between this crushing water and lifesaving air.

It felt like forever.

Then my chest started to stiffen. My arms and legs became weak. I began to sink, and I thought, _so this is what drowning feels like._

_Peeta, I'm so sorry._

I almost didn't notice when something took me under the arms and hoisted me up. and suddenly I felt cold. And wet. And heavy, that was the worst part. Heavy. And then sleepy.

_Katniss._

I knew that voice. But it didn't matter. The air hadn't come.

_Get up, Katniss._

My vision clouded, and he was there, staring down at me, the sun forming a halo where his head got in the way. But this was no angel.

_You have work to do._

Then he kissed me. And I could finally breathe.


	5. Chapter 4

Thanks for all the comments so far! This is the first story I've published in about a decade, so it's nice to know I can still hold an audience. I learn quite a bit from the reviews, so keep them coming, and I might update sooner! :)  


* * *

**Chapter 4**

~ Katniss ~

_Gale... come back..._

He was gone as quickly as he'd appeared. My eyes were readjusting, the sky was gone and replaced with a dim fluorescence. Ceiling tiles? Something clicking, whooshing. I felt a rush of pressure, then slow release. It happened again, in exactly the same tempo as before. And again. My head felt thick and slow. I was somewhat aware that I was no longer wet, and as my vision sharpened a bit, I realized it was partially obscured by something being held very close to my face. I couldn't feel it, but it was there. And then my arm wouldn't lift when I wanted to grab whatever it was, to pull it away. My fingers could flex a bit, but my arms... yes, both now... were useless. Legs too. Tried to swallow, for some reason it felt wrong. Or rather, didn't feel at all. Pressure still building and releasing.

I didn't have anything left in me to panic with. Or I didn't care. Either one worked.

A door clicked open. A forehead and dark brown hair entered my vision, and I had to strain my eyes left to see the rest of the face it belonged to. A young, palefaced man was asking me, quietly, by name if I could hear him.

Well of course I could... but with this thing on my face and useless limbs, how was I to tell him this?

"Blink if you understand me," his voice offered.

I blinked once.

"Good," his voice sounded relieved. "My name is Simm, you were brought to our clinic, and you're safe here. Do you understand?"

_Why am I here?_ I blinked again.

"That's good," he seemed satisfied. "Your family is here, would you like to see them?"

_My family is dead. At least the parts that matter._ I blinked again, wondering who he could possibly mean.

I couldn't strain my eyes any further, so when Simm left my field of vision, I had to wait impatiently for my next visitor to hopefully get that I can only see so far on either side from this position.

"Afternoon, Sweetheart." Haymitch Abernathy. Gross.

"Katniss? You with us, honey?" Greasy Sae. Now her, I guessed I could accept as family. I blinked again. I was getting good at the blinking thing. Couldn't do much else.

"Don't worry about a thing, Sweetheart. We have it handled." Haymitch. _Worry? About what? Doesn't worrying require some form of motion? Can't do that right now._

"Are you going to tell her?" Sae to Haymitch, hushed. Like I didn't have ears.

"Don't make her worry, she's in no shape to help him right now."

"Help him? I'm talking about him helping her!"

"He doesn't even want to see her!"

"Well he would if you'd stop being a pushover and make him do it!"

"Who you calling a pushover?"

I was blinking spastically. They finally noticed I was still there.

"Now look what you did!" Sae thwacked Haymitch on the shoulder, then returned her attention to me. "Katniss honey, he's just scared. I'll see if I can coax him in later, would that be all right?"

_Who?_ I looked around. _Peeta? You mean Peeta? Where is he? Is he all right? Why won't he... oh. _Images came flooding back to me, the black eyes. The vacant, yet hateful expression. His fingers closing around my throat. Now I had an idea what the device over my face was for. And why I couldn't move. My head swam. What did I do that triggered him?

"She looks pretty upset. Maybe it's a bad idea." Haymitch again.

"Well why don't you go talk to him again, I'll stay and keep Katniss company, all right?"

Haymitch paused. "Hmph," he muttered, and left my field of vision.

Sae stared at me critically for a moment, then sighed. _Focus, Sae, I need to know_. Somehow I think she heard me. Or was thinking what I was. She was fairly okay at the latter, most of the time. We were practical like that, probably why we got along so well.

"Do you remember what happened?"

_Yes._ Blink.

She nodded. "And you want to know what caused it."

_Yes._ Another blink.

She considered this for a moment, then smoothed my hair back with her hand. It only took me a second to get it. My eyes widened. Sae saw this and nodded. She continued by summing up what Haymitch told her, so I only got the short, short version. But I understood. How could I have been so stupid not to know this? I started blinking, but not in answer, just to stop the tears that were gathering. He'd done that, trying to protect me. He had no idea this would happen. He must be beside himself.

"Oh honey, he scares you doesn't he?" Sae looked more than a little shocked, like this possibility had just dawned on her. One of the few times she was way off, and it had to happen now.

_No,_ I wanted to tell her. But they hadn't given me a sign for that. Whatever drugs they'd given me that were fogging my mind must have started to wear off, because suddenly the panic started creeping back in. I could see it happening; Sae thought the tears meant I was scared, she'd leave and tell Haymitch, who would make Peeta stay away, making Peeta think I was afraid of him, and making whatever horrible guilt he was going through that much worse. I had to stop her. I wanted Peeta.

My hands clenched and released, and I made my feet squirm. I could sort of feel my arms now, and tried to lift them. I felt restraint; I must have been tied down. Sae watched me, looking confused. I had to tell her. Make her see that I needed him. The thing on my face, it prevented me from talking. Oh I got it now, it was making me breathe. Like I'd forgotten how, or couldn't on my own. Well I'd show them. I waited for the pressure to build, then I tried to make some kind of sound. Nothing. I tried again on the next forced breath, and I managed to create something that sounded vaguely like a squeak. Again, and the squeak was a little louder. I felt something shift in my throat, now that I could sort of feel my throat, and it was like knives. My head, I realized, was pounding. I tried swallowing again, and whatever success I had with that brough on a fit of coughing, which definitely made noise, but the pain was unbearable.

Sae left my line of vision, and the pale face from earlier returned, speaking soothing words but none I could discern from the spasms. Something sharp entered my arm, and my head swam, the throbbing dulled, and my eyelids got heavy. _No, I don't want to sleep. I need a sign for 'no.' No, no, no no no no..._

~ Peeta ~

One-way glass was all that stood between me and the girl I loved. The girl I had almost ended. Haymitch made me stay in the waiting room while he checked on her. We stayed all night, they said she was resting comfortably. I had no idea what that meant, but it couldn't have been true after what I'd done to her.

I could see her, watched the machines breathe for her, give her medicine. I hoped it did what it was supposed to, and took all the pain away. She didn't deserve to endure any of it. I'd take it all on myself if I could. I felt the prelude of a tremor buzzing in my head as a stole short glances at her. Anything longer would be too dangerous. So I sat on the tile floor under the window, facing away. Terribly close, but painfully far.

One of the medics made me sit still while they put some kind of treatment on my face. I told them I didn't want it but Haymitch insisted. I wished he'd hit me again, I deserved it and more. So much more. I didn't sleep.

Sae came in the morning. She wouldn't look at me after Haymitch told her what happened. She spoke like she knew I hadn't meant it, but I could tell she was afraid and angry. I didn't blame her. Then the medic... Simm was his name... came to us and updated her condition. Her recovery depended on remaining absoutely still over the next few days, while her new trachea set. There was nothing more to do but wait.

I slept on the floor as well, or at least attempted to. Sae was across from me in a chair, her head occasionally rocking back and hitting the wall behind her. She'd startle awake, glance in my direction to make sure I hadn't run off, then go back to sleep. Haymitch came back around dawn to relieve Sae, not quite sober but definitely able to handle me if the need arose.

Day three. She started to wake up, they made her sleep again. Probably best, but my stomach twisted knowing that she'd been conscious, and I hadn't been able to look at her long enough to see her eyes, even for only a moment, to see that this was her and not the illusion, in a desperate attempt to change her in some other way as to keep her safe from my rages. I hoped the drugs they gave her provided a break from the nightmares. Haymitch made me eat a sandwich, and every swallow brought a fresh awareness of her pain. I slept on the floor again.

Haymitch brought clean clothes, made me change and eat another sandwich. The bathroom mirror showed my cheek had turned a sick yellow-green. I slapped it, hard, and it brough tears to my eyes. It was the least I could do.

Haymitch went into her room sometimes. Sat by her feet, sometimes talked, sometimes didn't. He kept asking me to go in, that he'd hold me back if he had to, but I just shook my head. I was so bitterly ashamed of myself.

The floor under the window was my companion again that night. In the afternoon, Medic Simm asked Haymitch and Sae in to see her, she was awake. My palms pressed to the glass and I endured the needling in my head for as long glances as I could steal. I was glad she couldn't see me.

I watched them argue over her. Her eyes, the only way she could communicate, blinking rapidly. Haymitch came out and said I should let her see me, that he thought I could handle it. I shook my head again.

"She'll forgive you, you know," he consoled me.

"I don't deserve it."

He snorted. "That's exactly why she will."

She was suddenly fighting the restraints, and then it sounded as though she was choking.

_Katniss, please... just stay still,_ I willed to her. Peripherally, I saw the medic inject something into her arm, and the spasms stopped.

Sae marched out and addressed me, for the first time in days, her Seam drawl sticking to me like tar. "Well, that's it. She's terrified of you." She half-heartedly patted my arm, and left.

It wrenched my heart, to have confirmed what I already knew, but I was stunned all the same. Hot tears streaked down my cheeks.

I'd lost her. Forever.

There was no going back. I crumpled to the ground, my legs sprawled out before me. Haymitch was saying something to me, but I couldn't hear him. My heart pounded in my ears, and I hoped it would stop altogether. Maybe, I'd make it stop, myself.

"Haymitch..." I croaked. He just looked at me. "Is she sleeping now?"

He nodded.

I swallowed, then got shakily to my feet. "I want you to come with me, hold me back." I sniffled, closed my eyes. "I need to say goodbye to her."


	6. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

~ Peeta ~

Haymitch took my by the shoulders. "You're not getting off that easy, kid. We'll try again when she's awake."

I shook my head furiously. "No, Haymitch, I refuse to put her through anything else. She's in there because of me. If she doesn't want to see me... I won't end things by terrorizing her further. She deserves so much more..."

"What she deserves is to be able to think on all this without being tied down and drugged up," Haymitch interrupted me. "And," he stopped me again as I was opening my mouth to protest, "she deserves to hear your explanation and whatever monumental apology you've got. She deserves..." he put up his hand to stop me yet again, "your patience. Look, she can't talk right now, she can't even move. From personal experience, that's a pretty scary way to wake up."

I shut my mouth. It wasn't like Haymitch to make speeches or give pep-talks, but when he did, he could be painfully convincing, even when he was less than sober. My stomach was still painfully knotted and my heart was breaking, but only slightly less hopelessly, if that was possible.

"Peeta," he continued, "none of this is entirely your fault. If your mind hadn't been messed with, then, well... let's just say you were just trying to make the best of a bad situation. I'm not gonna get into any coulda shoulda woulda about you not talking to her or... me... or anybody else about you tryin' to fix yourself, 'cause it doesn't change what happened. That's the only place you messed up. And that's what you need to apologize for... so if you keep blaming yourself for having these tantrums in the first place, that won't be the last time I lay you out."

I gulped.

"Now," Haymitch sighed. "I brought you a sandwich. You're going to eat it. Then we're going to meet that head doc of yours at the train." I half-opened my mouth again, but Haymitch was on a roll. "Yes, I called him, figured he could help you sort through your issues. And before you get a mind to protest, his word is the only thing keeping you out of a detention cell."

The idea was perversely tempting. "Maybe I belong in a cell."

Haymitch rolled his eyes. "Don't start with me, kid."

~ Katniss ~

The next time my eyes opened, I was aware of being slightly cold. It took a moment to remember what happened before. Was there anything new? I checked, fingers and toes moved, arms and legs still restrained. Still looking straight at the ceiling. Vision, still restricted to where my eyes could turn, and some brace around my head acting like blinders. But my face... my mouth felt a bit numb... my tongue could lick my lips, and my breaths were my own. Well, that was an improvement. I felt less foggy, but rather... indifferent? Like whatever was happening without me was nothing I could help, regardless who it was happening to. No sense in getting worked up, they might knock me out again. I just wished someone would come in here, I think I was getting colder. I called out.

"Hhhhhe..."

Or at least, I tried to. That was not my voice. That wasn't even what I'd tried to say. I tried again.

"Hhhhaa..."

Nope, and it was uncomfortable, trying to make useless sounds. My throat was starting to burn.

"Hello, Katniss."

The face from before, the pale one, and in better view than last time. Simm, I think his name was. He cocked his head to the side. "Do you remember what happened?"

I just looked around.

"I'm sure you must be confused, but you're doing much better. If you'd like, I can untie your hands, but you have to promise not to move around much. Can you do that?"

_Yes._ I blinked deliberately.

He gave an encouraging smile. I felt my left wrist being freed, and then the right. I rubbed them where the restraints had made contact, bringing them up where I could see them. No damage, apparently. My elbows felt stiff. My hands went hesitantly to my neck, they barely brushed some kind of gauze before Simm caught my fingers. He brought them to rest on my stomach.

"I'd leave the bandages alone a while longer, you're not quite healed yet," he told me. "Would you like me to explain what we did?"

_Yes._ Blink.

He shifted, probably to seat himself next to me. I could still see him. I found I could turn my head, but just slightly. "Well, your trachea was crushed. We had to remove the damaged section of it surgically, and insert a replacement. It's flexible and once you're healed, you won't feel the difference."

_Well that doesn't sound too bad. But what about my voice?_

"Your speech will be another matter, however," he read my mind. "You'll need to undergo a bit of therapy to sound like yourself again. But that should only take a few months."

_A few months? What am I supposed to do until then, point and grunt?_

My face must have revealed my confused distress adequately, for he continued. "In the meantime, you'll be assigned a tablet. It may be a bit frustrating at first."

_A tablet? What is this, the Stone Age? Am I supposed to carve into it with sticks?_

I heard the door behind him, and he greeted someone briefly and thanked them before turning back to me. He held a rectangle of black glass up for me to see. "Here it is." He touched the corner, and it lit up. He brushed a finger across the surface, and where he traced, lines were drawn. He wrote his name, 'Simm,' on the screen. Well, I'd at least been right about his name. He pressed a button that wiped the screen clear, held it out for me to try, and I took it hesitantly. It was lighter than it looked.

"Don't worry, it's fairly indestructable."

I held it for a moment. _What do I write?_ I was stumped for half a moment, then I remembered. Quickly, I scrubbed my finger across the page. 'Peeta.'

Simm read my work. "He's just outside. Do you want to see him?"

I blinked. It was faster than writing.

"Are you sure? I was informed what happened. Mr. Abernathy has been watching him closely."

'Him too', I wrote.

He patted my knee. "You got it."

After he disappeared, my stomach tightened suddenly. _Am I afraid? I don't think so... at least not the way Sae had inferred. Maybe I'm just feeling a little lost, out of sync. And tired, there's that too. But Peeta... How long was I asleep? How long has he been dwelling on what happened? He must feel so guilty..._

I heard voices and shuffling to my left, it sounded like they were just outside the door.

"I can't, Haymitch, I can't..."

"She asked to see you, now suck it up and get in there."

"What if I..."

"You won't. Just go."

_I hear him! Where is he? _I tried to make my neck turn just a little more, but I couldn't. My hand reached out, palm upward.

"Oh for spirit's sake..."

Then Haymitch was in my view, struggling slightly. I guessed he was towing Peeta along beside him. I reached further.

"Well, go on," Haymitch said, a little more mildly. "She wants you, not me."

It felt like the moment went on forever. Then, very gently, warm, rough fingers brushed mine. I curled mine around his, and weakly pulled him to me.

His watery blue eyes were shocked, and so sad. But he held my hand. And stared down into my eyes. I formed his name silently on my lips, and his breath hitched in his throat.

I brushed his hand with my thumb, and remembered the tablet in my other hand. I set that down at my side and reached shakily toward his face. He knew what I wanted, and obliged, hesitantly, bringing his face to meet my hand, and I pulled him down to my chest. He cried quietly.

Haymitch rolled his eyes, patting Peeta awkwardly on the back a few times before backing off a bit.

"I'm sorry... I'm so sorry..." Peeta mumbled, over and over.

I stroked his hair. His right cheek was bluish and bruised, I tried to avoid touching it, I didn't want to hurt him. His arms rested carefully on my sides, his face on my chest warmed me. "Shh," I soothed him. The whoosh of air through my teeth was easy to do, I found. Just like breathing, my voice not needed. It was a while before his breathing evened, just a few hiccups here and there. I brushed the tears from his cheeks, carefully avoiding the bruise, and he raised his head a bit, wiping his nose on his sleeve. His eyes never left me.

He reached toward my face, hesitantly, carefully, palpably afraid of hurting me. I gave him a weak smile, the best one I could afford. I saw him fight not to cry again, as his fingers brushed my cheek, and came to rest on my hair. His face crumpled, and he struggled to contain himself. I knew this would be hard, I just had to give him time.

He heaved a few shuddered breaths and sniffled. "Katniss... I... I don't have words to tell you how... how desperately sorry I am," he choked, closing his eyes for a moment, trying to gather himself. He heaved a breath. "If... if you'll let me, I'll do anything... whatever it takes... to earn your forgiveness."

I was lost for a moment in his heart-wrenching apology, and then felt a twinge of guilt at making him wait for my answer. I reached for the hand that had stopped to rest in my hair, and brought it to my lips, marking his knuckles with a kiss. Peeta looked stunned, either he couldn't believe I'd let him off the hook, or he'd taken my response the wrong way.

I hated dropping his hand, but the tablet required both of mine. Simm was right when he said it would be frustrating to use. I had to hold it up to see it properly, and in doing so it blocked my view of Peeta's face. I worked quickly, then turned the tablet toward him.

'_Nothing to forgive._'

This brought on a fresh round of tears, as well as a number of confessions and promises. I was pretty sure Haymitch was still closeby, and probably gagging. Before Peeta could get carried away, I stopped him with the tablet again.

'_Please tell me what happened.'_

Peeta gulped. He wiped his face on his sleeve, looking a bit lost. I patted the edge of the bed, and after a moment he convinced himself to settle there. I waited patiently.

"Katniss... do you remember, it was pretty soon after we got back to Twelve, after the end of the war... when I had those early tremors and thought sometimes what I saw would change if I concentrated enough?"

I blinked. Peeta looked at me, confused.

'_Blink = yes._'

"Oh. That works." He took a deep breath and continued. "There are only a few bad ones I ever have anymore... I haven't been telling you about them and now, I know that was wrong of me. This one in particular, about you... it had me confused a number of times, and I couldn't distinguish you from the hallucination. I really couldn't, but I had to, so I could stop them when they started. I couldn't bear the thought of hurting you accidentally."

I blinked. He took that as a sign to continue, and nodded.

"So, the next time that one came, I tried to make something different about the other you, the one that was showing me such horrible things... so I'd know she wasn't you. And... it worked." He gulped, then took a heavy breath. "Until... until you came home looking the way I'd made her."

'_You made her hair short?_' I wrote, the guess was obvious.

He nodded. "When I saw you..." his face started to crumple again. "... all I saw was the hallucination, and now you know... in my head how I make them go away..." He choked out a few sobs, desperately trying to contain himself again. I had started to forget just how hard the hijacking had been on him, what he went through in forcing them to pass. He handled his tremors so well these days, and he'd rarely brought them up, even when I'd ask he'd tell me it was okay, that it wasn't so bad. Seeing him so broken about something that was beyond his control tugged painfully on my heart. Tears now burned in my eyes as well.

Peeta sniffled, pulling himself together, and looked down at me deliberately. "I'm going to take such good care of you." He squeezed my hand.

I blinked, both in acceptance and to release the tears that had collected. Roughened, gentle fingers brushed them away. I took to the tablet once again.

_Does my hair bother you now?_'

Peeta looked away for a moment, and Haymitch stepped back over. "His doc gave him some new meds." Peeta looked shyly proud, and my heart leapt. What a relief it must be for him.

"They've worked on some of the worst-affected victims, Peeta told me. " They don't get rid of the flashbacks, but they're supposed to help separate them in my head. I just wish..." he paused. "I wish... that I'd gone to visit him in the Capitol a month ago when he first asked me. This would never have happened."

I squeezed Peeta's hand, and he squeezed back. He offered me a small, apologetic smile, one that most would think was hardly adequate to communicate the immense guilt he felt, but I knew better. He knew I was uncomfortable when he'd bring up things that might have been, if we'd done things differently. That was a road we'd decided long ago we wouldn't ever go down, but we slipped sometimes. We were only human, after all.

I suddenly felt tired. I had so many more questions, but writing took considerably more effort, so I just wrote one more.

'_How long?_'

Peeta looked puzzled, then realized. "Almost a week," he said, his fingers stroking my hair. I allowed my eyes to flutter, half-closing at his touch. "Are you getting sleepy?"

I blinked, but not as deliberately as before. He knew, though.

"Want me to stay?"

As my strength left me, I squeezed his hand. I felt his lips press against my forehead.

"I love you... so much," he whispered.

~ Peeta ~

She'd forgiven me.

I was still so bitterly angry at myself, and not completely trusting of the medication, but things were easier. She rolled her eyes when I told her later that I didn't feel like I deserved it, but she'd still forgiven me. It didn't take lines of script on her tablet for her to remind me that she felt the way Haymitch did; she was more than a little irritated that I'd been keeping so much bottled up, but she was right. And so as they came to mind, I would tell her things.

I had only a handful of tremors in the weeks that followed. None before we brought her home from the clinic, but after. I had so much more control over them now when they happened, they weren't less frequent but they were milder, more of an out-of-body experience I suppose. But the fear that one could get away from me drove me to ask her to leave me to handle them on my own. To go to Haymitch's until it was over and I came to get her. I was becoming more confident, but I would never put her in harm's way again. Ever.

Dr. Aurelius helped, when he was around. Or rather, he took really extensive notes, and described empirically what he and his team had been working on to get the treatment to where it was. He lost me when he started going into formulas and amounts, but I got the general notion that the venom I was given is something called a 'bio-accumulator', something that the body doesn't ever get rid of naturally, so the more you take, the worse your symptoms are. And I hadn't had the worst of it... there were a number of victims who had to be locked up to keep them from hurting themselves and others. Dr. Aurelius told me in confidence that one was a child... I told him it would be better if Katniss didn't know about that.

He also told me that I was the first of his patients who had figured out how to manipulate their hallucinations. I hoped it would be helpful in treating at least some of the others. We'd all be taking the treatment, or some later version of it, for the rest of our lives, so we had something in common. I was curious about them... but not curious enough to go back to the restructured Capitol with the Doc yet. Katniss needed me, so I was staying. And thought I didn't deserve it, I needed her too. I'd promised to take care of her.

She sometimes didn't like it though. I think I hovered too much, and she preferred her solitude. Most days she pinned her hair back or secured it with a handkerchief, it fell in her eyes otherwise. I often saw her mindlessly feel behind her back to twirl the end of the braid that was no longer there, and sigh in loss. I was thankful she hadn't tried to run off to hunt, that would have been quite the squabble... except she couldn't speak well enough yet to defend her position. I'd walked with her to all her therapy sessions, but she made me stay in the waiting room. I think she was embarrassed at how she sounded, but when she finally started to speak, her voice progressed to just sounding like she had a really bad cold, but it was an obvious relief to her that she could communicate again. Haymitch didn't help much when he commented that his geese sounded better than she did. He laughed. She threw her tablet at his head.

Her nightmares were worse. I wondered if some were about Gale, after that first one, but if they were, she didn't tell me. She'd open up about the others, but just didn't want to talk about _him_. I tried to hold her, as always, and sometimes she wanted me, other times she'd push me away, and I'd find her later, curled up on the porch swing or that old wing chair of her father's that she'd brought from the Seam house. I tried not to take it personally... she was just like that sometimes.

The investigator from Two called three weeks after Katniss came home, demanding to speak to her. I sat at the kitchen table pretending to make a grocery list, but of course straining to make out the faint voice from the turned-up receiver as Katniss listened to a long string of questions they fired at her.

"_Did Captain Hawthorne ever contact you about his work?_" He hadn't contacted her at all in the time since he'd left Twelve, so of course not.

"_Where was Captain Hawthorne from the night of October 17th until the 22nd of last year?_" Of course, she didn't know.

"_Did Captain Hawthorne associate with..._" and he listed a number of people, a few familiar names from their time in Thirteen but none of whom she'd been in contact since, and the rest of whom she'd never heard of.

This went on for the better part of a half-hour, sometimes returning to previous questions, and Katniss' already strained voice was overtaxed by her short answers. It felt from the tone and the that they were trying to trip her up. It felt familiar to my time under the Capitol's control, and became exceedingly uncomfortable to witness. Katniss looked drained when she finally hung up.

"Are you okay?" I tested. It was a stupid question, but she knew coming from me, the question was always genuine.

She sighed and closed her eyes for a moment, clearing her head. Then she nodded. I knew she was lying, though. I held out my arms for her, and expected her to decline my invitation, but she surprised me. I pulled her down into my lap and wrapped my arms around her waist. It felt good when she leaned into me.

"What did he get himself into?" she whispered rhetorically.

I sighed. "I just hope they catch whoever did it."

~Katniss~

I fingered the uneven edge of another note from Hazelle, hastily torn from its notepad and scribbled upon. Both she and my mother had been told I'd had a sore throat and that I'd been resistant in taking care of it, thus the reason I was avoiding their calls. Mom had given up, but Hazelle had resorted to writing. Her words were vague, but I got the picture that there were things happening, things she couldn't say over the phone or on paper. She didn't outright ask me to stay away, but she didn't have to. The code we all grew up with to keep the Peacekeepers in the dark was as useful now as it was then, and the words I read worried me. It was reason enough to pay a visit. I wasn't leaving Hazelle to face whatever this was by herself, not when she didn't have Gale to look after them. And something felt not-quite-right about that investigator, so I supposed it was safe to assume that he played some part in the situation. I tapped the edge of the paper against my lip, thoughtfully. I had to get to Hazelle as soon as possible, and without Peeta. Not that I didn't trust him or his ability to handle whatever was going on, but there were some things I would never put him through again. And walking headfirst into what I feared could be a dangerous situation was at the top of that list.

The evening news reel was on in the sitting room, more about the upcoming election. I'd curled up in my father's chair after bringing in the mail, listening to the talking heads drone on about this candidate and that candidate, Paylor's ongoing interim presidency and her campaign to serve an additional term. Peripherally, I could hear Peeta clanking the dinner dishes in the drying rack.

Peeta liked Paylor. I can see why he would, she's polished and straightforward, compassionate in her stances and steadfast in her desire for District autonomy. Which sounds all right of course, especially after the previous administration. I just wasn't that into politics.

The next thing I see on the screen threw me back to the worst few seconds of my life. The talking head is describing what I'm seeing, but he doesn't even come close to communicating what it means. How it feels. _What is this? How can they show this?_ The running water behind me went silent, and then Peeta was there, moving to sit on the floor next to me, leaning his head by my feet.

Paylor's form had returned to the screen, waving to the Capitol crowd, flanked by a four-strong gray-and-blue-clad protection detail. But I still existed in the last thing I saw.

"_I wish to express to my fellow Citizens my unwavering loyalty, to the people before the politics, and I stand firm in my belief that our greatest strength is in cooperation and faith in one another. When that faith is challenged, as it was earlier this month-_"

Peeta turned to look at me. I must have hidden the trauma well, because he just looked curious and turned back to the television.

"_... there must be due diligence in bringing justice to those who would take such action. Rest assured I remain unharmed from the event, and am more dedicated than ever at fostering compassion, negotiation, and integrity as cornerstones for our great nation's future. Violent dissention, neither in public or behind closed doors, has no place in that future." _Paylor waves to the crowd again, and the talking head returns, moving on to the next candidate.

Peeta switched off the television. "Are you as confused as I am?"

My eyes narrowed, not focusing on anything in particular. My chest was tight. "You missed the first part," I whispered, voice shaking, mostly used up from the interrogation earlier. "A bomb went off at one of her scheduled appearances, in District Two."

I fought to meet his eyes. "Peeta... it dropped in by parachute."

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**AN: Reviews = updates people. I want to hear what you think, good or bad.**


	7. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6**

~Katniss~

Peeta's eyes went black. He squeezed his eyelids shut and shook his head, as though to fling away the invading hallucination. "Katniss..." he breathed.

"Going." I touched his face briefly, then sprang from the chair, stepping over him, and sprinted out the front door, not bothering to close it behind me. I banged on Haymitch's front door, he opened it in seconds.

"Again?" he asked, not really interested in the answer. He headed off to my house, I stood on his porch and waited.

And thought. And tried not to think. And resisted. But the images and faces came anyway. It was like the weeks after it happened. Ordering a new bow from the catalog after my father's had irreparably broken. The stocky, strong-jowled street dog in Two, staring us down from behind a rusted chain link fence. Parachute bombs on the evening news, drifting peacefully downward, then detonating behind the grainy texture of the glass screen. No matter how much time passed, some small thing, some little detail would bring me back to that moment again. And everything I'd felt was dredged up, fractured and rotten, to parade before me.

"Katniss?"

I wasn't sure how much time had passed, but I was suddenly aware that my fingers were screaming from gripping the wooden porch railing. I released my hold, only to feel the goose that was nibbling at the seam of my pants leg. Peeta's hand was at my back.

I nodded, exhaling. His face was worried. "All better?" I asked him.

"I'm all right now. You?"

I resisted my first answer. We did have an agreement after all. "Not really." I sank into a wicker chair. "Just dragged up all the old stuff. Made it fresh again." My hand was being sandwiched between both of Peeta's, and he'd taken the chair next to mine. Haymitch disappeared inside for a moment and returned, pressing a glass of something into my free hand. He watched the news as we did, so he didn't require any explanation. It was one of those bitter moments when we each knew exactly what was on the others' minds, that there was nothing we could do, but were content to share the stale, ambient misery.

I cleared my throat. It didn't do anything to help my voice, but it relieved the itching in my throat that I couldn't scratch. I was stalling; I didn't really want to know what his hallucination had been, considering the trigger was something he hadn't encountered yet, to the best of my knowledge. I sucked it up. "So... what was yours?"

Peeta shook his head. "I'm not sure you want to know."

The pain that had dug into my soul just minutes before was now rather dull, I was strangely numb. The amber liquid I'd been sipping could take credit for that. "Try me."

He took a long, stabilizing breath. "Well, I started to remember where I was before the bombs went off the last time." he explained. "It was fuzzy until now... I think because I kept getting stuck between hijack mode and trying to stay out of hijack mode." He was quiet for a minute. "I think... I think I saw her. Right before..." His eyes were on me. "I think I tried to get to her."

I was glad whatever was in my glass was alcoholic. I chugged it quickly, let my head swim. Haymitch raised his glass in our direction and took a swig himself. It dawned on me that we were all in the exact same place just over a month ago, in a very different set of circumstances. No, I should be thinking about the fact that Peeta just mentioned that he'd seen my sister before she died. But I was there too, and I hadn't seen him. The smoke had been awfully thick though... and the scene far too tragic to see everything clearly. I guess he could have been there, somewhere on the other side of the child barricade. But I was supposed to be mourning my sister all over again right now. The mention of her should make me cry. Sob. Scream and throw things in the agony that I'm here and she isn't. Why wasn't I doing these things?

"Haymitch, I need another one." He poured, I drank. The late evening darkness was a surreal blur. Peeta and Haymitch talked, I swam in the bourbon ocean. I think I understood why Haymitch drank as much as he did. It felt... not bad. I wouldn't be as bad as he was, I thought. I was only semi-aware when Peeta lifted and carried me home.

He carefully dumped me on what I assumed was my side of the bed, the coolness of the pillow against my cheek rousing me slightly. Eyes closed, I fussed over the buttons of my shirt until more nimble fingers than mine interrupted to take over. I ran my hands up his arms, the sudden urge to touch him creeping in to replace the sleepiness. He held me upright to slide the shirt off, then went to the button at my waist, lifting me to slide the pants off my hips. My heart rushed in my ears, and I lunged at him, lips crushing against his, fingers tangling in his hair. The taste of the sweet bread from supper mingled with the sips of bourbon that had crossed his lips was madness. His hands came up to rest on my back for a moment, allowing me this break from character, then brought them to my waist and slowly pushed me back.

The corners of his mouth twitched upward. "You're making it hard to get you ready for bed, you know."

I swallowed, immediately feeling guilty. Not quite rebuffed, but definitely deflected. I dropped my hands and stepped back. My head swam again, and he was there to catch me before I fell, pushing me back onto the bed. He retrieved a clean shirt from the dresser and pulled it over my head, fingering the clips out of my hair and setting them on the nightstand. He pressed a kiss to my forehead, and I knew that was the end of that.

"I'll be right back," he promised.

I brought my feet up to sit cross-legged, wondering if I'd crossed a line, not quite sure where that line was, and if this desire to cross it was more me or the alcohol talking, or some combination of both. And then he was back, a plate of rolls in one hand, a glass of milk in the other.

"Eat some, it'll help absorb part of what you drank," he guided.

I nibbled on a roll, taking sips of the milk when he offered.

"I'm sorry," I whispered abruptly.

He chuckled. "What for?"

I looked at him sideways. He knew what for. Was he teasing me now? Or was I being too sensitive? My voice was still raspy, but sounded more like me than it had yet. "I think I see now why Haymitch drinks," I shook my head. "It feels good for a while, but it makes me do things I wouldn't normally do." My speech was a tiny bit slurred, but Peeta made no mention of it. "I'm sorry I presumed... _that... _was something you wanted from me."

Now it was Peeta's turn to shake his head. "Katniss... I do want _that_," he told me. "But... it's not something I want _from _you, it's something I want for both of us. To share withyou. But only when you're ready, and not while you're impaired. I couldn't look at myself in the mirror again knowing I'd taken advantage of you."

He was better than I thought. He always was. There wasn't a manipulative bone left in his body, and I chided myself for thinking there was now.

"Maybe I want you to take advantage," I muttered. "You're always so damn honorable. Maybe I want you but I don't know how to tell you..." I clapped my hand over my mouth. Where had that come from?

"Katniss," his hands were on my face, sweeping my hand away from my mouth. "Thank you, for finally being honest with me." And then his lips were pressed on mine, sweetly, not hungrily as mine had been earlier. When he broke away, I felt the separation, but not the rejection that came with it last time. He brought his arms around me, holding me against his chest, stroking my hair softly. "You know, I think I like your hair like this," he whispered, his lips by my ear.

"Hmm?" I was confused, and he sensed it. He brought me to lay down next to him, facing me.

"It hasn't affected me, since it... set me off," he looked away briefly, shame flickering across his face. He shook it off, knowing I hated it when he beat himself up over that. "Doc thinks the stress of what I thought I'd done kind of... undid its effect as a trigger." He sighed. "I still see the vision the way I arranged it, but it's like... not putting yeast in the dough, the result is flat. There's no reaction. And now... I can really see you this way, and you look... nice."

I scoffed. It didn't hit me until later that it was like I was brushing off his epiphanic admission. "Nice?"

He smiled. "Fishing for compliments? Maybe I _do _like you better this way." He captured one of my hands and pressed his lips to my knuckles. "Beautiful."

I blushed, the corners of my mouth turning up. I wondered how long it would have taken us to reach this moment without alcohol, for the walls to come down. Well, there was one wall between us, more of a buffer really, the intoxication's dulling effect. I wanted to keep this going as long as I could.

"Can I tell you something?" he tested, suddenly serious. "I'm not sure how you'll feel, but I need to tell you."

I nodded.

He took a deep breath, the way he always did before telling me something he felt might change how I feel about him. "The vision I had tonight..."

My breath hitched in my throat suddenly, when I realized where this was going.

"Katniss, please listen, I need you to know," he pleaded, his hand touching my cheek.

I shuddered a sigh, then nodded for him to continue.

He swallowed. "I didn't remember that day until now... but I've always known the feelings behind it. I know you hate it when I bring up things that we can't change. I've watched you struggle with this since we've been back here, and as much as I want to do something, anything to help you, I know I never can, when it comes to her." He sniffed, his eyes were ringed with red. "I can't change what happened. But if there had been more time, if I could have gotten to her faster..." A single tear rolled sideways across his face. "I remembered... that I was prepared to get her out of the way, and... to take her place."

He was in my arms before any more tears could fall.

"Why are you telling me this?" I wondered.

"Because..." he choked between sniffles, "I needed you to know... I loved you that much... even when I thought I didn't."

Another urge prodded me, this time in my heart. I knew it wasn't the alcohol talking, not this time. "I... need to tell you something too," I said, releasing him.

Peeta's face was inches from mine. He swiped his hands across his cheeks, wiping away the moisture that clung there. He looked worried, then realization hit him. "You love me. Real or not real?"

My hand found his and I brought it to rest over my pounding heart, sighing. "Real."

Once upon a time, a five-year-old boy met the girl of his dreams. He watched her in school, noticed when she came and went on the street by his parents' store, and more often, sat and dreamed of what might be. And fifteen years later, she would tell him that she loved him. A normal boy would have rejoiced. But Peeta hadn't been normal for quite some time.

"Say something," I nudged.

His eyes flickered, betraying his confusion. He blinked a few times, then opened his mouth. "You don't mean that," he whispered.

Something dissolved inside me then, and another thing awoke. It wasn't simply anger, or hurt, or any emotion I could name. Mechanically, I pulled away from him, rose from the bed, and walked out of the room. I went downstairs, hearing him call after me, but the thudding in my ears drowned him out and my legs kept on moving. I went through the cellar door and locked it behind me.

Peeta was already knocking desperately on the door. "Katniss! Katniss please, I have no idea why I said that, I didn't mean it! I believe you! Katniss, I love you so much, please believe me. I'm so sorry. Katniss..."

I could hear the words, feel his anguish. I knew he didn't mean it. But it was the excuse I'd been looking for. It was cheap and underhanded, and something the old me totally would have done. It was even something the old Peeta might have done, but his intentions were always rooted in my survival, where mine were based upon keeping him as far away from this as possible. In a twisted way, I was looking out for him too. I had my way out. I was going to see Hazelle.

The sacks of flour weren't comfortable, but they were a better alternative than the concrete floor. I pulled an old quilt out of one of the never-unpacked boxes and covered myself, bringing my hands to rest over my ears. I thanked the alcohol that remained in my system, that would give me some peace tonight. The numbness would be long gone by morning.

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**There are a few ways the story can go. I'd love to hear your ideas. Please review!**


	8. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7**

~Peeta~

No matter how hard I tried, I would always fail her. That's what the voice was telling me, at least. The one that followed me home from the Capitol, that reminded me of things that had been said to sway me, things I'd started to believe myself, and it had spoken for me so many times. They'd made me believe that she'd lie, about the one thing I wanted most. The words escaped me before I could do anything to stop them. And then she'd escaped me before I could take them back.

I woke up on the floor, wedged in the narrow hallway, unable to unlock the door to the cellar but making sure I'd know if she opened it, or hear if she came up the steps. The door handle creaked, and I startled, she peered into the hallway, rubbing her eyes. I was on my feet as fast as my artificial leg would allow.

"Katniss, I'm so sorry," I began, but she held up her hand to stop me, and stepped past me to the kitchen. I followed close behind. She started rummaging through the cabinets until she found the aspirin. I clumsily grabbed a glass, filled it with water from the sink, and held it out to her. She drank deeply, downed a few of the aspirin, and set the glass on the counter. She never once looked at me before heading upstairs to the bathroom, locking it behind her.

I heard the water run for a long time. I waited. When she finally came out, I moved out of her way, but stayed with her, standing in the bedroom doorway as she pulled yesterday's pants back on, threw on a jacket over her shirt, and yanked boots over her socked feet. I imagined she was going hunting before she took down a bag from the closet and began stuffing random clothes inside. My heart plummeted.

"Katniss, talk to me, please!" I begged. "What I said yesterday, I'm so sorry about that, I haven't felt that way in a long time, and I don't know why it came out when it did. I didn't mean a word of it. I believe you. I love you, too."

She finally stopped, slowly zipping her bag with a deliberate finality. She looked up at me. "I know," she said softly, genuinely. "I need a time out, though."

I closed my eyes, lowering my head in defeat. My breath hitched in my throat, the pain in my stomach slicing over and over. Had it come to this? I couldn't drag up a coherent thought; all my arguments were rendered invalid. I had to let her go. It was the only way to keep her.

I felt her hand brush my cheek. When I opened my eyes, she stood before me, her eyes were drawn with pain as well. "I meant it, Peeta. I still do. I just need time."

I nodded. Without thinking, I pulled her in and held her close, drinking in the scent of her. She barely hesitated before wrapping her arms around my waist. "I will wait for you," I promised.

She spoke, her voice cracking. "Tell me, Peeta. I need to hear you say it."

I gulped, knowing exactly what she meant. "Always."

She kissed my cheeks, brushed her thumbs over my eyelids to close them. I heard the swish of fabric, then the door clunked downstairs. And she was gone.

~Katniss~

I kept telling myself that it was for the best, that this would keep him from whatever uncertainty I was about to walk into. I knew I was being selfish for not telling him the truth, as we'd promised each other. Going to help the Hawthornes was more important that sitting around Twelve, making smalltalk, hunting, working in the garden, visiting Haymitch, and all the other mundane things that had become our routine. The more I thought about it, the more I realized I was trying to justify my leaving Peeta to face... my leaving Peeta. _Did I really just leave him? _I was suddenly disgusted with myself. It was never that I didn't think he could handle this; he'd been increasingly more relaxed and almost normal on the new meds, well, as normal as can be expected after what he went through. But bringing him into this level of uncertainly, it just seemed selfish to ask it of him, no matter how much I wanted him with me, and no matter how much he would have fought to come if he knew where I was going. I should have let him make that decision. My stomach squeezed unconfortably to punish me. I had to hope that I hadn't irreparably damaged him, and that when this was over, he'd forgive me. Peeta, always looking past my obvious flaws and forgiving my faults... there are some treacheries even he wouldn't forgive.

I stared out the window, trying to get lost in the changes in landscape, but inevitably associating the mossy forest with the first arena, the wheat fields and orchards with Thresh and dear, sweet Rue, and the endless, barren plains with the countless tributes who died at my hands, at the hands of the Capitol, and all those that were lost so that no more children would be sacrificed for the Games. I hadn't brought anything to read, the letters from Hazelle had been forgotten but were well hidden at home. I wasn't really interested in watching television, but I did anyway. Aside from the highly edited news station, the rest was superficial garbage. I wondered what Peeta was doing.

Getting ready for bed alone on the bullet train reminded me of my first journey to the Capitol. I tried pushing that from my mind, scrubbing my teeth with the complimentary toothbrush. I'd have to take that with me, in my haste to leave I'd forgotten a number of unmentionables, things that didn't really matter, but thinking of things like this provided less-than-adequate distractions. Like the cup of mint tea I'd ordered earlier. It was brought in my a middle-aged Avox woman who smiled pleasantly, but whose eyes held thousands of secrets. I found myself desiring a conversation with her, and wished I'd brought my tablet, but I didn't even know if the woman could write. She reminded me of the red-haired Avox, of Darius, of all the others who were remnants of a regime of suppression. I wondered when the people of Panem would forget what we fought for.

I settled on the silk-sheeted mattress and clicked off the lamp.

"My name is Katniss Everdeen. I am twenty years old. My home is District Twelve. I survived the 74th and 75th Hunger Games. I was the Mockingjay. I killed people. I didn't want to kill people, but they wanted to kill me. I lost my father, my sister, and my best friend. I love Peeta Mellark. Peeta Mellark loves me... I hope Peeta Mellark still loves me..."

_Welcome aboard, Catnip._

"Gale." I startled. Leaning against the bulkhead of my compartment, the moon backlit his silhouette, reminding me of a more recent train ride. I could see his legs and arms crossed casually. He waited for me, and I waited for him, but I lost patience first.

"Why do you keep coming back?"

He scoffed. _You know the answer._

Did I? This was my dream. I'd wanted to know things; the fact that he could never tell me what I wanted to know didn't mean I would stop wondering. And I was on my way to visit his family, of course there was a chance I'd think about him enough while I was awake to invite him into my dreams.

"Okay... how is you being here going to help me figure all this out? That's what you want, isn't it?"

_Oh but you forget, I'm not really here._ He crossed leisurely to the bed, sitting down on the corner, leaning on one arm and looking at me sideways. I could see his gray eyes now. _As for your next question, I have a better one. Why don't you lie?_

I was going to ask what I should tell his mother when I got there.

"She's your mother, Gale. She could see right through your stories, and I'm just not that smooth."

_True. But the investigator doesn't know that._

That thought hadn't occurred to me.

_Of course it did, this is your party, remember?_

"Don't do that."

_Sorry, Catnip. This is all happening in your head, after all._

"Thanks for reminding me."

He kept staring at me, still waiting.

"So... I need to know what I'm about to walk into. You're not really here, and I need specifics. How exactly is this helping?"

Dream Gale sighed. _You're not asking the right question._

I thought. "The investigator working on your case asked me about people you worked with... some were from Thirteen. Do they have anything to do with this?"

_Maybe._

"Maybe?"

_Keep asking._

"Is your investigator involved?"

_Of course. Isn't that obvious?_

"Should I trust him?"

_You know better than to trust anyone, Kat._

"Why would your mother want to keep me away?"

_Probably to keep you safe. She is a better mother than yours is, no offense._

"None taken." I pondered. "So, this might have something to do with me?"

_Safe to assume, yes._

I went out on a limb. "Does this have anything to do with the assassination attempt on Paylor?"

He chuckled. _Now that, Catnip, is the right question._

I paused to consider something. "If you've never really been here, then how do I know you want me to find out who killed you?"

He was suddenly inches from my face, gray eyes boring into my own. _I don't. You do._

I awoke with a start. Pink-tinged midmorning light peered harshly at me through the shades, shaming me. No, that request wasn't mine. It couldn't be. Revenge? With one very dark exception, that wasn't me. But there it was, waving in my face.

My hair was an effective camouflage on the walk through town, and I was thankful. It was hotter this time of year, even at this altitude. A thin layer of sweat had my clothes sticking to me by the time I reached the front door of the Hawthorne's home. I knocked, waited, and knocked again. Nothing. It was a Wednesday, the kids would be in school, I thought. Hazelle was always home, well, she always had been in Twelve. I went around the side yard, feeling over the six-foot-high wooden gate for the latch, and recoiled as something snapped at my fingers. The latch clinked open, the gate swung out toward me, and I leapt back. Hazelle's mothering voice came clear over the aged wooden boards, yelling at me.

"You come around here asking questions at all times of the day and now you're going to sneak around my property? I ought to..." She was struggling to pull a cart full of produce backward through the opening when she saw me. Her eyes narrowed. "Katniss?"

"Hi, Hazelle," I greeted her carefully, rubbing the fingers that had been struck.

She let go of the handles and the cart turned over. "What in the bleeding earth are you doing here?" she demanded, voice hushed, the old Seam drawl resurfacing. We knelt to upright the cart and throw the escaped items back in. "I knew that investigator's been bothering you at home, did he ask you here? Oh I did try to warn ye to stay away!"

"I know you did, and I'm sorry. No he didn't ask, not in so many words," I told her, scampering around to retrieve some rogue gourds. "You can't send me letters hinting that something's up and expect me not to come. You're family. If you're in trouble, I want to help."

Hazelle dropped a final apple into the cart and got up, moving to wrap me in her arms. "The hair is an interesting touch." She kissed my cheek. "It really is good to see you. We have to talk."

She ordered me into the house while she wheeled the cart to the edge of the street. "Vick and Posy deliver food to the quarry at the edge of town," she explained, insisting on carrying my one light bag upstairs to Posy's room. "Poor families don't always have enough to get them through 'til payday. Cargo trains been running slow the past few months, had a blowout on one of the main tracks from the grain distribution hub. Some kind of explosion. They're not saying much on the news, but I was hearing of accidents happening long before this," "I don't hear much since Gale..." her eyes flickered with sadness, but she quickly shook it off, "well, he usually kept me informed."

"Hazelle, I can't tell you how sorry I am. I still... I think about him a lot."

She rubbed both my arms. "I know, dear. He thought the world of you. What happened to... well, it changed him. I don't think he'd carried more regret in his life than he did over that."

I nodded, and we silently agreed to stop that kind of talk right there, before we both broke down.

"So, I'm here. Tell me what's going on."

_Knock, knock._

Hazelle and I exchanged glances, mine curious, hers fearful. She went to the window and peeked out, then jumped as though she'd been lightly shocked. She turned back to me, her voice becoming a harsh whisper.

"Stay here, and don't make a sound. Mind the floorboards. He comes by every day, sometimes twice. He's watching us."

I crept over to the door after she'd closed it, lying on my belly to listen through the space underneath.

"What can I do for you this afternoon, Mr. Weaver?" came Hazelle's bright intonation, muffled from where I lay. It sounded like she was trying to pull off an edge of irritation.

There was a pause for several seconds, there was a shuffle of soft shoes on the gritty wood floor, a distinct tap of polite footsteps, but no clunk of the front door closing. "Mrs. Hawthorne, you can spare me the pleasantry. I know she's here."

My stomach tightened. I hadn't blended in well enough on the walk here. I wondered if I should run... but then I'd risk looking guilty.

"Who's here?" Hazelle's act might have convinced me, but it wasn't convincing the visitor.

"Shall I call her out of hiding, or would you prefer?"

More hesitation.

I heard the front door close, and Hazelle's voice rang out, defeated. "Katniss, would you join us downstairs?"

He was as composed as I'd seen him the last time. Well dressed, impeccable manners. Dark hair perfectly combed. The way he considered the teacup Hazelle had set in front of him. It reminded me again of Capitol propriety. I despised him on principle.

"What is it you want, Investigator?" I decided to be direct. Hazelle brought her own cup clattering to the end of the table and seated herself, looking shaken.

"Such hostility, Miss Everdeen. Or is it Mrs. Mellark? That distinction was never made clear in the official census record." He brushed a bit of lint off his perfect suit sleeve. "I'm glad to hear your cold has improved. How are things at home?"

"How is my personal life relevant to your investigation?" The fact that he'd immediately connected Peeta to this irked me to no end.

"It isn't, pardon my curiosity." He adjusted slightly in his seat, eyes battling with mine, as though the limited conversation was simply a cover. "Shall we revisit a few questions from your interview?"

I tried to look bored. It wasn't difficult. "Why don't I ask a few of my own?"

An air of entertainment crossed his face. "I should be glad to hear them," he said. I noted that he said _hear_, not _answer_.

"Why haven't you found Gale's murderer yet?" I Hazelle flinched. I resisted the urge to glance her way, this question required all directed force.

"I shouldn't have to tell you that a murder investigation is a lengthy and involved process," he schooled me. "Cooperation is key in identifying suspects. Now, would you say that you've been cooperative?"

Hazelle might be afraid of this guy, but I was irritated, and not just a little. I resisted the urge to judge him superficially, but he was like the members of my old prep team... so involved in what they were trained to do that anything outside or resistant to their bubble of knowledge was something to be either deflected, ignored or silenced. I wondered what Mr. Weaver's occupation had been prior to the rebellion.

"I could say that I've answered every question you had during my interview truthfully and to the best of my ability, but can you say that you've cooperated with the needs of the Hawthorne family?"

"I am not required, rather I am pleased, to cooperate with the body of information provided during one of my open cases. As you are part of that body, do you assume the responsibility of submitting to further questioning?" Deflect, deflect, attack.

"Are you accusing me of something, Mr. Weaver?" My voice rose.

"Do you have something to be accused of, Miss Everdeen?" he countered, his tone teady.

"Oh plenty," I stated, "all of which was dismissed during my hearing two years ago, but you seem to have something else in mind. Why don't you educate me?"

"You really are a piece of work, the boy had it right," he chuckled darkly.

I'd heard those exact words before, from Peeta, just a few days after his rescue. "Wait, what?"

"I'm surprised you don't recognize me, Miss Everdeen. Though you may not, I wasn't exactly in the public eye." He shifted casually in his seat. "I directed the stability assessment on Mr. Mellark after his arrival in Thirteen."

Okay, he'd tripped me up. He was there? Why didn't I know this, and then why was he now attached to this investigation? I decided to voice the latter question.

"That's not exactly public information, but rest assured my interests lie with the well-being of Thirteen's former citizens," he said in avoidance. "I'd rather thought my familiarity might bring comfort to this unfortunate situation. Comfort makes people more cooperative. Do you feel comforted, Miss Everdeen?"

"Hardly. I doubt the Hawthornes are comforted either." I finally stole a glance at Hazelle, she had her forehead propped on one hand, worried as ever. I turned back to the investigator. He still looked amused. "I'm here to ask you to leave them alone, Mr. Weaver."

"I can't do that, Miss Everdeen, thought I wish that I could. My orders come directly from the President herself." He rose from the table, his chair scraping against the floor. "We will speak again. I advise you not to leave the area."

My eyes met Hazelle's. I'd get the whole story from her, _after_ I de-bugged her house.

"Oh and Miss Everdeen," the investigator called from the doorway, "The Mockingjay's influence with this administration is rather inconsequential. I wouldn't expect my reassignment anytime soon."

"Well isn't he delightful?" I said, dripping sarcasm after the door had shut. I brought my finger to my lips, and Hazelle nodded her understanding.

It took the better part of an hour, but I found close to a dozen listening devices and a tiny camera, and threw them in a cup, pouring water over them. I'd bury them in the yard later. If they could survive shorting out, they'd only be listening to the worms' secrets.

"Hazelle, please tell me everything."

She looked around quickly, then nodded. "They think Gale was into things he shouldn't have been."

"What kind of things?"

She gulped. "Building things. Like before."

"Bombs?"

She nodded again. "They haven't said so outright, but it's what they implied. They think he'd gone rogue with some of the old crowd. Trying to oust the President. I told them Gale would never do such a thing, and they dared say I didn't know my own son as well as I'd believed..." her voice cracked, and I pulled the older woman into my arms.

"They're wrong Hazelle. They're wrong."

She nodded into my shoulder. "I don't know what to do. He comes around every day, asking the same kinds of questions, I think he's trying to trick me into saying something, like I've been hiding things. And he pokes around like he owns the place, he goes up to Gale's room and... and..."

"Shh," I soothed, then pushed her back to arms length. "You're not alone in this anymore." I didn't dare mention my suspicion that linked Gale to the attempt on the President's life.

She sniffed. "I won't let him ruin Gale's memory for the younger ones."

"I won't either." I moved to settle her at the table again, refreshed our tea. "How are they holding up?"

She took a sip, conflicted. "Posy and Vick are doing better. They've made friends here, so that helps. But Rory..." she trailed off for a moment. "It's been difficult. He sees what's happening. He rarely talks. He goes to school, does the minimum, comes home, does his chores, and goes to bed. He has nightmares, but won't talk about them. Mr. Weaver has tried to question him, but... well you can picture how that usually goes. I do my best to interfere, but you can imagine how that goes as well."

I sighed. "I know it's hard to think about, and I wouldn't ask if it weren't important. But do you think Rory knows something?"

She shakes her head. "It's hard to say. He's been to a doctor in town, they say he's traumatized. I don't know if he knew something before it happened. I doubt it... Gale was always so careful to keep his work separate from home. He and Rory spent quite a lot of time together though, so I admit it is possible."

"We'll figure this out," I said, reaching across the table to grip her hand. My promise hung silently in the air.

The front door burst open again. "Katniss!" Posy's gray eyes lit up and she squealed excitedly, dropping her bag and throwing herself into my lap. She was small for seven years old, but a solid little thing. I kissed her on top of her head. "Oh Katniss, your hair!" she tugged at my locks.

"Hi Katniss," Vick leaned in to hug me as well, and I squeezed him back. Hazelle had raised her brood respectably; extended family was treated with obligatory affection, but from Vick, I knew it was voluntary. I realized then how much I'd missed them.

"All right you two," Hazelle swatted at them. Do your rounds and then we'll have a nice dinner. Katniss may be staying with us a while."

"Is Uncle Peeta here too?" Posy queried expectantly. Hazelle had started the 'Uncle' title back when she thought we were engaged. It had stuck with little Posy.

"I'm afraid he couldn't get away this time Posy, I'm sorry," I told her. Posy had grown rather fond of Peeta during our brief previous visit, and Peeta was really sweet with her. It made me feel rather guilty, suddenly, that even if we remained together, I wouldn't be willing to give him children. I shook off that thought before it took my focus from the present.

"Oh." Posy tried to hide her disappointment.

"Scoot," Hazelle shooed. "And tell Rory to come inside," she shouted after them.

There was a minor scuffle in the yard, and then the now-oldest son shuffled into the doorway. "Yes, Mother?"

"Hi, Rory," I addressed him carefully.

He looked suddenly unsettled. "Katniss." He looked from his mother, to me, and back again.

"She's going to stay with us for a while, son. All right?"

He nodded. He looked just like Gale had at sixteen.

* * *

Reviews welcome. Even if you hated it.


	9. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8**

~Katniss~

Rory's bow wasn't quite like mine, but it would do.

"Let's go hunting" had been neither a suggestion nor a command, but it was the only thing that had come to mind, and it relieved us both from the uneasiness in the kitchen.

Gale's bow was perfectly at home in Rory's nimble fingers. He'd snagged two prairie dogs and something he later called a 'marmot' before we really spoke.

"I hope my being here doesn't make things harder on you guys," I offered.

Rory shook his head. "It's okay. Mom's been plenty worried about you."

I sighed. "You even sound like him," I let slip. "I'm sorry Rory, I didn't mean..."

"Don't worry about it."

We sat down on a dry log, keeping the silence for a long moment.

"So..." he began, his eyes distant. "What do you want to know?"

"What do you mean?" I asked carefully.

"You came here to find out what happened," he assumed.

I kept my voice quiet. "I came... because I thought your family was in trouble. I came to help."

"I think that might make things worse," he finally looked at me. His eyes betrayed the weight that was on him, but they directed no blame.

"How?"

Rory sighed. "Mr. Weaver... he asks me things. Stuff I shouldn't know." He dug his toe in the dirt and his gaze drifted in no particular direction, plucking dry grass between his fingers and throwing it into the wind, bit by bit. "Gale would talk about some stuff from his work. Things he helped build. And I remember stuff he worked on when we were all in Thirteen. Mr. Weaver asks me about it all the time. I don't tell him anything, but I think he knows that I know more than I'm supposed to."

"And... is that bad?"

Rory snorted. "It is when you see his inventions trying to kill people on the news."

"I knew it..." I whispered.

"Huh?"

"Oh..." I shook my head. "Are you talking about what happened to Paylor a few weeks ago?"

"You saw that."

"I saw a replay last week... and then your mom said something about accidents... freaked me out a little."

"Just a little?"

"Okay, a lot."

"Because of Prim."

I was silent for a moment. Her name struck me, but didn't choke me as it usually did. "Yeah."

Rory cleared his throat. "I, uh... loved her, you know."

I nodded. "I know." I put my arm around him and pulled him down to me, let his head rest on my shoulder. It looked a little backward, me comforting him this way... he was as tall as Gale was at sixteen, but a little more built, and definitely bigger than me.

Rory's breath hitched in his throat, but he refused to cry. Just like Gale. I planted a kiss on top of his head. "I keep seeing it, over and over," he said.

I didn't have to ask what he was talking about. To see a family member die, or to find them afterward, no one should have to endure that. _That we both experienced this, no matter how differently, is the reason he's able to talk to me_, I decided. It was a while before he leaned away again. His eyes were red.

"I saw Mr. Weaver before. Before all this happened," he said.

"Yeah, he was in Thirteen with us for a while, or so he said when he stopped by this afternoon."

"He was here today? He knows you're here?" he panicked.

"Calm down, Rory, so what?"

"What did he ask you?" he demanded.

"Nothing important. He questioned me, I questioned him right back. We postured. He left."

"He was in Thirteen? When? _Why?_"

"Something to do with Peeta's mental stability, after he was rescued."

Rory considered this. "So he's trained to mess with people's minds. Great. That's just great." He was plucking little grass clods and chucking them at a tree trunk, making them 'puff' as they broke apart.

"You remember seeing him in Thirteen?" I prodded.

"No, not then. Here. When I brought Gale lunch on weekends at work. I wasn't supposed to stay, but Gale showed me around once. I saw him then."

"They worked together?"

"I don't know. But I think... I think he knows I saw him there. He keeps asking me what I know about what Gale was working on around the time... when he..."

"You don't have to say it."

He sighed softly. "Thanks."

We were quiet again for a while. Rory picked the clay-dirt from under his nails with a twig.

"He wanted to tell you everything, you know," Rory said.

That jolted me. "What do you mean, Rory?" I asked carefully.

He looked at me seriously. The eyes, the expression, all Gale's. The voice, even. "I was so angry at him when I found out what happened to Prim. Angry's not even a good enough word. I hated him. For a long time. I hated my own brother." Rory gulped. "And now, I hate that I hated him, because I can't get that time back. I'm just glad we made up before."

"I'm glad of that too, Rory. You meant so much to him."

"You meant more."

"That's not true."

"It is." He turned his body toward me. "I may have hated him at the time, but he was too busy hating himself to notice. He knew Coin caused it, but still called it his fault. He was so wrecked over it. She was like a little sister to him too. It broke him. He knew you'd never forgive him, and that broke him more. When I finally had it in me to yell at him, and boy did I ever... he just sat there and took it. Thanked me after. One day he even told me he wanted to beg your forgiveness. Said if he could go back he would have taken her place. But it wasn't for me... he didn't even know I liked her... it was for you. So you'd forgive him. And he wanted it so badly."

The answers I'd been waiting so long for collapsed on me. Bringing my face down to rest on my hands, I struggled to breathe. My best friend... the one I trusted with my life so many times... of course I couldn't blame him. If he hadn't made those bombs, among so many other things, my sister may still be alive. But we would have lost the war for sure, and in the end, none of us would likely be here, stricken down by the hand we'd been dealt. Thank goodness for Gale. He hadn't betrayed me, I had abandoned him.

Rory put his hand on my back. "Can I show you something?" He pulled me to my feet, leading me south into the forested valley. He didn't let my hand drop, rather he threaded my fingers with his. It was more intimate than I'd have expected from him, but it wasn't unnecessary either. The terrain was rather treacherous through the tall yellow grasses, and he saved me from falling more than once. A stratified rock wall rose slowly from the ground and we followed it; pebbled stones crunching under our boots. Where it met a small spring, it rose to a point, and I took in a breath. The wall was cut out underneath, as though thousands of years of rushing water had carved it, leaving behind columns of red sandstone. The late sun hit the natural wonder like a fiery blaze. Water trickled out from the face of the rocks, dribbling down to the pool below like a hundred tiny waterfalls. Fire bled water, in this place.

"It's incredible," I breathed.

"Yeah," Rory said nervously. "Listen, I need to do something, he made me promise. All right?"

I looked at him seriously. "That depends on what it is."

"Nothing bad or inappropriate, I promise," he said.

I considered for a moment, then nodded to him.

He swallowed a breath. "Gale said if you were ever to come here, even if you didn't want to see him, I should bring you here. He found this place while we were moving in. He wanted you to see how beautiful it was. And then there was all this stuff I was supposed to say about how sorry he was, and how he wanted you to be happy more than anything else. Even if it wasn't with him. He said he was happy you had Peeta, that he was right for you. But he hoped that if you were to ever forgive him, that you'd tell him, in this place." Rory laughed a little. "He was actually planning to be here, hiding, if I brought you. I don't know why he thought you might come, but he hoped. And here you are," he sniffed. "And he's not here to go through with it."

"Oh Rory, he asked you to do that for him?"

Rory shook his head. "Not for him. For you."

I closed my eyes. "You know how I know you meant the world to him?" I asked.

He paused. "How?"

My eyes opened. "Because he shared this with you. Knew he could trust you with it. And you didn't fail him."

Rory looked as though this had never occurred to him. I squeezed his hand and dropped it, walking to the water's edge and kneeling down. I dipped my fingers into the clear water, and it seemed to pull so much of the bitter, long-held anger away. "I forgive you, Gale. I wish I could have told you before. And I'm sorry," I whispered. The water rippled back toward the tiny waves created by the dripping falls, reflecting in the sunset, like the answer to an age-old question. I wondered how long it had been asking.

Rory was next to me when I stood. "Thanks," he said.

"You're a good brother, Rory. The best."

He nodded. "I still try."

The wall of fire faded as the sun fell behind the hills. "We'd better get back, Mom will be worried enough as it is."

"How is she?" I asked as I followed him. "How are all of you, I mean?"

"She's... worried most of the time," he began. "Hasn't had time to grieve, really. She plays the strong mom bit really well, but I see things. Vick's starting to realize there's more going on, but he's so passive, he doesn't like to ask too many questions. That's probably good. And Posy..." he shook his head, a small grin bringing up the corners of his mouth. "I haven't seen her smile, actually smile until today. I should have known you were here when I saw that."

"She's taken it hard, hasn't she." It wasn't a question.

"Yeah. We all have, but she doesn't understand. All she knows is that someone hurt Gale, took him from us. She was too young before, to see how bad people can be, but she knows now. It corrupted her. She used to be so happy to meet people, now she's real clingy, she hardly talks to the people she knows."

"I remember that feeling," I said softly.

"Yeah," Rory agreed. "I think we all remember. But it hit her different."

"Well, we'll just have to remind her that people can be good, too."

~Peeta~

They say when you're waiting for something, or trying to keep your mind off something else, to stay busy. I don't think _they _ever had to wait for Katniss Everdeen, or to try not to think of her, at the same time. But if I were to succeed at either, the bakery was the place to try. I'd holed up in my studio the day she left, after I figured out how to move again... but she was all over the canvasses, her hair, skin, and eyes at the end of every brush, and in every tube of paint. I had to get out. The assembly line methodology of commercial baking was routine, consistent, and dare I say dull, but the hot ovens, new burn marks on my hands and steady stream of cheery customers were almost sufficient to make the time pass less slowly.

"So this is where you've been."

I jumped, a hot tray of wheat rolls gripped between threadbare towels slipped and I received yet another angry red line, this time on my wrist. The rare, hushed profanity passed my lips. I dropped the recovered tray on a wire rack, slammed the oven door and turned to the counter. "What can I get you, Haymitch?" I hoped my voice hadn't come across as defeated as it sounded to me.

He frowned, shrugged and shook his head. "Nothin'. Just wondering where you ran off to. Haven't seen either of you in a week."

I leaned on the counter. "Well, she took off, and I've been sleeping here in the office." Simple and direct. No use hiding what was true.

"What?"

I looked down at the new burn on my wrist, it stung but didn't bother me that much. It was just something to focus on. "She left me."

He leaned on his palms toward me. "No wonder you look terrible."

"Do I?" Not that I especially cared. I bathed, combed my hair, kept up the appearance of cleanliness around the shop as was expected, but other than that, I hadn't really looked at myself.

"All right. Tell 'Ol Haymitch what happened."

I drew in a long breath. "I just said something I shouldn't have. I was stupid."

"I doubt that was all."

"Seriously. That's what happened."

Haymitch came down to lean on his elbows. "What'd you say?"

"I told her I didn't believe her."

"That's it?"

"After she finally admitted she loves me."

Haymitch's eyes popped. "She... what? And you, what?"

"Yeah."

"But why?"

I sighed, having thought of nothing else for six days and not having an answer to show for it, but I opted to skip the pain-induced sarcasm for some honesty. "Doc thinks it's a side effect of the new meds. Like the voice in my head took control for a second. That's all it needed to ruin my life I guess."

"Wait... you have voices in your head now?"

"Not like that. Just the same old inner conflict. You remember the story they told us in school about the Katibin?"

"It's been a long time since I was in school, boy."

"The Katibin... you know, the dueling whisperers, one in charge of the person's good deeds and the other in charge of the bad, and then they argue over who has more. It's like that."

"Oh those. Yeah. The come sit on my shoulders when I drink. It's rather entertaining." Haymitch shook his head like he was trying to rid himself of some mental image. "So... you're blaming your tactlessness on some dueling voices that told you to say something stupid to make her leave you. That makes total sense."

I didn't have it in me to roll my eyes, so I went back to the neglected bread tray.

"Sorry kid, I'm just trying to wrap my head around it."

"So am I."

"So she loves you. Wow. 'Bout time."

"Yeah."

"So... go find her and tell her you're sorry."

"I told her I didn't mean it. It was too late."

"Well go find her and tell her again."

"I... can't."

"You don't know where she is."

I shook my head, throwing six rolls each into cloth bags and tying them.

"And if you did?"

"She said she needed time."

Haymitch snorted. "So she said she loves you, but then she said she needed time, and then she leaves, to go who knows where. There's something else to this."

"Aside from the part where I told her I didn't believe her?"

"Boy, girls like it when you chase them. It makes them feel... special."

I wondered what he was going to say before 'special' came out. "She's not like other girls."

"And that's why you love her."

"That's why."

"I still think there's something you're not seeing."

"Like what?"

"Did anything else happen?"

I shrugged, throwing the last bag of rolls at Haymitch to take home. "That investigator called and asked her a bunch of questions, then we watched the news and I had that tremor, then we were at your house..."

"Wait, back up... that jerk from Two called? I told him to leave you guys the heck alone."

"What? Why did he want to talk to you?"

"Character reference. Seemed awful keen to pin something on 'the late Mr. Hawthorne'. So what happened?"

"He interrogated her for a half hour, till her voice was raw. She was upset all through dinner. The news came on, you know the rest. Anyway, after I took her home, I got her something to eat so she wouldn't be so sick in the morning, and we talked. And then I was stupid, and she went and locked herself in the cellar all night. She came out in the morning and I tried to tell her I was sorry, but she said she needed some time, and she packed a bag and left."

"Could he have said something to her?"

"I don't think so, she had the ringer all the way up and I heard almost all of it."

"Think she went to talk to him in person?"

"No way. She can't stand that guy, she said he gave her the creeps when she met him before Gale's funeral."

"Think she went to see her mom?"

I just looked at him.

"Right. Where else?"

I shrugged. "I'm not going chasing after her, Haymitch. That's the last thing she'd want."

"I guess." Haymitch pondered. "Think she'll come back?"

I leaned over the counter again, forcing back the tears. It's all I'd wondered since she left. "I don't know. I hope so."

"Me too kid." He patted me roughly on the arm. "Listen, uh... come on by after you close up shop. And keep an eye out for my brown goose will ya? Haven't seen him in days."

"Sure."

I didn't find the goose, but I found its stinking, half-eaten carcass on the kitchen floor, and a very pleased-with-himself Buttercup lying victoriously nearby. I decided to dispose of the body, burying it near the primroses in the back yard, rather than returning what was left to Haymitch. I found it a funny thing that the back door was open, I hadn't remembered opening it, but in my haste to get out of the house I must have.

"Sorry Haymitch," I cringed, holding up a lone brown feather. "Cat."

He just sighed. "Serves the damn bird right for running off." He took the feather from me and stuck it in the dirt next to a browning potted plant. He poured me a drink and we sat on the porch a while. I tried not to think about the fact that the last time I was here, so was Katniss.

"You're thinking about her."

"Guilty." I stared off into the darkness down the street.

"So... what are you gonna do?" he prodded.

I shook my head. "Nothing I can do."

"Not true. There's always something."

I didn't really know how to respond, so I just took another swig of the bitter amber liquid. It went down like fire.

"Okay, let me rephrase," he adjusted crudely in his chair. "If you could do anything right now to bring her home and have things go back the way they were, what would you do?"

I considered this, conflicted because the one thing I most wanted to do would probably drive her further away. But the question wasn't what I wanted to do, but what would bring her back to me. "I don't think things can go back to the way they were, honestly," I told him. "I've messed up too many times-"

"Not your fault," he cut me off.

"I know some of it's not," I interjected. "But sometimes, after... I feel like there was something I could have done better, or different... something I should have known to do or not do. It kills me that I could have killed her that day, and it stings so bad that she forgave me. She always forgives me, but this time, it was like too many things added up. I'm not worthy of her trust. I think she's better off without me, no matter how much I miss her." I held out my glass and he refilled it.

"Hey kid, I'm all up for wallowing in a stupor with you tonight, but come tomorrow, we're gonna sober up and figure out what went wrong. I haven't stuck by you two this long to let you give up on each other." He clinked his glass into mine.

"You my counselor now?" I slurred.

Haymitch burst out laughing. "I thought you were mine."

There was something genuinely funny about how wrong and right he was, that I burst out laughing right with him. The world spun from lack of air, and when I finally caught my breath, I couldn't remember what was funny.

"To Katniss," I raised my glass. "May she find what she's looking for."

"And may she come back safely, so I can stop babysitting."

We clinked to that.

The morning dawned drizzly and gray. The idea of sleeping where I fell was appealing at the time, but the result was uncomfortable to say the least. Looking around to get my bearings, I remembered why I was there. Then, I realized the more I looked around, the worse my head and stomach felt. Finally, I came to the realization that if I had a left leg, it would be asleep from the angle at which it was propped against the railing. Instead, the seam where real flesh met the artifical leg was screaming from having been strained while I slept. I lifted my pants leg to rub it, finding it angry and red like the welts on my hands. I was still fascinated at how real the leg looked and how well it usually blended in where it connected; I still wondered why the Capitol gave me the upgrade during my captivity. Perhaps it was something to remember them by. I didn't remember any flashback associated with it. I hoped I never would.

When I was able to push myself to a standing position, I thumped Haymitch on the arm to wake him. His snores were interrupted long enough for him to look around, to understand I was leaving, and then his head rolled back and he was out again. I limped home.

I retrieved the aspirin first, using the same water glass as I'd given Katniss the week before. The memory stabbed me. I went up to the bathroom and contemplated being sick, but my stomach was fairly empty at that point and in no mood to be filled. I showered, my head pounded, and I dressed. The drawers she'd rummaged through were still open. _Stab, stab, stab. _I picked up her discarded shirt from the floor and smelled her on it. The comfort of this simple act stabbed me as well.

I wandered through the house, not wanting to lay down to ease the pounding in my head, it would only be replaced with the agony of loss that much sooner. I found myself on the couch where I'd slept so many times, yanking the scrapbook we'd assembled from under the cushions and flipping through the pages. I didn't usually look at it unless she'd asked me to draw or write something, but I figured if any of it was going to cause a tremor, now would be the safest time to tempt one, while slightly crippled by this headache. I sat back against the cushions to get more comfortable and pulled the book with me, and a few loose papers fell into my lap.

"Hello," I mumbled. Gathering them up, I set the book aside. The papers appear to have been hastily torn from a notepad and written quickly.

_K-_

_P says you've been ill, I hope it's nothing serious. Things couldn't be better here. The children are happier than ever. Our guest comes daily and has been delightful. We'll vacation with you when we can._

_-HH_

My heart sped up. HH... that had to me Mrs. Hawthorne. Katniss hadn't told me they'd been exchanging letters. _Couldn't be better... happier than ever... delightful... _those were far more joyful words than commonly used by residents of Twelve, definitely not by former Seam residents, and absolutely not by a grieving mother. Something was off. I read the next one.

_K-_

_I hope this letter finds you well. Our frequent guest would be so grateful for a visit from you. He's confident the case will be solved soon. R, V and P send their love._

_-HH_

Rory, Vick and Posy. Any intuitive person would know from the tone that 'come visit' meant 'stay away'. But Katniss was never one to follow directions, especially where people she loved were concerned. The two remaining papers were crinkled envelopes, the first was dated three weeks ago and the second, last week. The day before she left...

I knew where she was.

* * *

**Reviews welcome, as usual.**


	10. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9**

~Katniss~

Dinners were uncomfortably quiet in the Hawthorne house. I found it was easier to talk one-on-one with Hazelle and each of the kids, but together, they were painfully silent. Their eyes were downturned, faces rounder than they'd been their whole lives but somehow still thin, and paler than was healthy. One word answers were the norm, and routines were established in an effort to lessen anxiety, but the air was o thick with it regardless.

I woke each day before dawn to Posy snoring lightly in my face, not remembering her climbing into my bed. If I'd had any disturbing dreams, they didn't follow me to wakefulness. Hazelle reluctantly tasked me with housework at my request, and then I walked the kids to school, using the venture into town as an excuse to poke around. With my shorter hair I was mostly unremarkable, though there were a few random flickers of recognition. My scars had been mostly polished away, but I'd been told that I carry myself with a certain austerity since being labeled the Mockingjay, so maybe that was it.

There was little intelligence I could gather without being an obvious snoop, so I limited my gathering to observation only, and it was a good thing I did. Mr. Weaver was a frequent and efficient visitor to the town center as well, and so I was able to get a sense of his movements, from where he ate to who he associated with. His associations were puzzling, to say the least. Mostly because those he met with, he did so behind the closed doors of the Justice Building, but also because his public interactions were bizarre. He often met with a set of well-built, twinned men for a midday meal at a busy outdoor cafe. They both had dark, wild, greasy hair, light eyes and appeared rather disheveled overall. They dressed identically as well. I wondered if it was so they could work interchangeably. The times I could get close enough to hear their conversations, which I did by sneaking under the raised wooden porch, they consistently revolved around 'the late Mr. Hawthorne.' I'd hear other random bits, but nothing concrete... not until the following Friday.

One of the twins had remarked about something concerning Gale's usefulness, and Mr. Weaver cut in.

"Mr. Hawthorne was only as useful as he was cooperative, and we all know how often he wasn't."

"But his information," said the other twin. "It's still relevant. It could turn everything."

"Irretrievable, as I said before," Mr. Weaver redirected. "But the others, especially the girl, may know something that they aren't sharing. The President wants to move forward with her campaign, and it can't happen unless all the elements are silenced. We have to keep the girl away from this. If this goes badly, we may need her. Can't risk another... accident." He threw back the remainder of his beverage and stood. That was my cue to disappear quietly.

I wandered around, dazed for quite a while, questioning myself. The one thing I knew for sure now was that any slight amount of confidence that may have built in Mr. Weaver's favor- he _seemed _genuine in short bursts despite the pushy overtones and lack of sincere consideration for the people he dealt with- had flown completely out the window after that last remark. He made President Paylor, someone for whom I held in high regard, sound like a scheming mastermind. How dare he! _Gale, is this what you knew about? Is it what got you silenced? And what do they think I know?_

I was the stoic one at dinner. Hazelle and Rory snuck concerned glances toward me, but I shook my head. I started to wonder if there was more they knew, but I shrugged that off as paranoia. The Hawthornes were some of my oldest friends, they would have told me what they knew, if there was something to know. I felt certain now that my sudden presence may have endangered them, and the thought sickened me. But if I left, it may confirm Weaver's suspicions about my level of knowledge or suggest an amount of guilt. Most importantly, I couldn't protect the Hawthornes if I was gone.

"Katniss," Rory came up behind me while washing the dinner dishes and inclined his head for me to follow. He stopped my hands when I reached to turn the water off. I glanced at him quizzically, and he put his finger to his lips. I nodded. He had a small television on in the side room, the one that could only be described as a makeshift office. I hadn't been in here before. Papers had been stacked haphazardly in every corner, and I wondered if the disorder had been a result of Mr. Weaver's investigation.

Rory pointed to the screen, then brought his hands to cradle his elbows. Gale did that too when he worried. I froze when I recognized the captioned pictures. Plutarch Heavensbee, and Beetee, stared out pathetically from the glow of the flat glass, looking worn and defeated. The talking head was reading a list of charges, including conspiracy and treason, and noted that the two 'criminals' were awaiting trial at an undisclosed location. He then reminded viewers of their history with the final Games and later, the rebellion. I stopped listening to the rabble when Rory's voice broke. "Gale and Beetee still worked together sometimes... before."

I lay awake for a long time that night. Posy slept with her mother, sick and restless with a slight fever. I'd unconsciously grown accustomed to her warm body next to mine and I missed it. I think her presence had dulled the ache I had for Peeta, and in Posy's absence, I allowed myself to yearn for his strong arms around me. His breath was far sweeter than the little girl's. Alone, I found that I missed him far more terribly than I had allowed before, and now, because I knew I'd feel safer if he were here, if no less shaken from what I'd just seen.

_Katniss, it's time._

Gale. I was dreaming again. "I wish you could tell me what I'm supposed to do," I said to his approaching figure. We were back in our old, familiar woods again.

_It's time._

"Time? Time for what?"

_To know._

He came to stand chest to chest with me, leaned in to brush his lips on mine. I pushed against his shoulders, but it was like pushing on smoke.

"No, Gale! I love Peeta." I shut my eyes, rigid against his advances.

He stepped back peacefully. _I know. _He grinned, and for the first time, it was genuine. _I was waiting for you to admit it. _He brought my hand to his lips, kissed my knuckles instead. _Be safe._

"Katniss! Katniss?"

My eyes broke open into semi-darkness, and I shot up, ramming into a solid body. "Ow," I complained.

"Are you okay?" Rory's voice came softly. "The wall facing my room is paper thin, I heard you crying."

I sniffed, realizing my nose was stuffy, and felt wetness on my cheeks. "I'm sorry, Rory. I'm fine."

I felt him nod, he was so close. "I know you're not," his voice was low. "But I get it. Neither am I." He was quiet for a minute, and since I didn't move, he guided me to sit back down on the bed, and moved to sit next to me. "Were you dreaming about what we saw?"

I shook my head. "I was dreaming about Gale, actually."

He nodded again. "He sneaks into mine a lot too. Did he tell you anything that might help us figure this out?"

He was kidding of course, but it felt nice to be on the same page when I shook my head. I found myself wishing I'd had a brother to confide in when I was growing up. Gale had been like a brother, but I could rarely confide in him, he'd already had more to worry about than anyone at that age should've had. Rory was different though. He was already deeply involved, already knew things.

"I found some things out today," I told him. "Well, yesterday, I suppose..." I corrected, glancing at the pink digital clock on Posy's little drawing desk. "Mr. Weaver has some rather scary-looking twins doing his bidding. They were talking about Gale like he was conspiring with them against the President, and they made it sound like Paylor was giving orders to silence the people working with him. They think I know something. He said they might use me if things didn't go their way."

"Use you? for what?"

"I don't know."

Rory looked abundantly rattled. "We have to do something," he whispered.

I shook my head. "No, we need to know more first."

"Katniss, don't you see?" he insisted. "Things are already in motion. Look what happened to Beetee and Plutarch. Those are good people. We know them. Whatever Weaver's people are up to, they're pinning it on guys who we know are on the good side, tearing down people the President trusted. Like they're trying to take out her credibility, and she's falling for it if she's having known heroes locked up. What if they're trying to overthrow the Republic? It's still shaky. They could do it, and while things are still so unsettled, it wouldn't be that hard."

Rory surprised me with his maturity and understanding. He'd been paying far more attention in Thirteen than he'd ever let on.

"What if they come for you next? What if they're coming now?" he finished.

"Discrediting the Mockingjay sure would put the cards in their hands," I admitted quietly, feeling the color drain from my face as I realized something else. "Just my coming here looks really, really bad. If they have Beetee tossed out, and he worked with Gale, and they discredit Gale by association, they could tie me in the same way. Oh Rory, I put you all in danger. I'm so sorry." I looked at him seriously, searching his wisened sixteen-year-old face. "Do you have any ideas?"

He nodded deliberately. "We should contact Paylor. She should be warned."

I gulped. "Agreed. But how?"

We crept downstairs to the cluttered office. Rory unboxed what looked like an ancient typewriter, clicked open a concealed flap and drew out a cord. He detached the phone from the wall and plugged in the device. "Gale used this, he and Beetee sent messages back and forth. If Paylor's smart, she'll still have people monitoring the lines." He flipped up an otherwise discreet, clear display and turned it on. A caret blinked. "Go ahead," he gestured.

I sucked in a breath. I'd only used a keyboard a handful of times in school. The keys were awkward and resistant.

_They know. We're in danger. -Mockingjay_

It was enough to convey the level of seriousness, but not to give anything away, if this fell into the wrong hands. 'They' could be anybody. Weaver's people would know we were in danger; we were in danger from them. Hoping desperately that Paylor would receive the message first, I pressed 'send'.

"Now we wait," I whispered. Rory unplugged the typewriter and put it away. "Rory, get your bow and keep it with you at all times. Just in case."

"What about you?"

I sighed. "If they take me, I'll go willingly. It might be the only way to keep you guys out of this, and the only way to figure out what's going on."

"No!" he protested under his breath.

"Rory, I know what you're thinking, but you have to protect the family. That falls on you. If they come for me, act stupid and scared, like you had no idea. Even ashamed that I might have had something to do with Gale."

"Kat-"

"Rory, you have to," I hushed him. "It's the only way out of this."

His face was tense, he pursed his lips exactly like Gale had when he was exasperated with me. I laid my hand against his cheek. "Please, Rory. "Lots of people have wanted me dead before, this is hardly different."

His eyes resisted, but he nodded. He went back to his bed with his bow clutched in his fingers, and I went back to mine with a fresh slice of fear, resigned to my probable fate.

~Peeta~

"Hey Haymitch, wake up!"

The older man was snoring ruthlessly. It was a wonder his tongue was still attached. I tapped his cheek. "Haymitch!"

His hand came up and swatted near his face. More gutteral rumbling spewed from his gaping mouth.

I sighed. "Enough already." The kitchen was beyond messy, but I managed to find a shot glass, rinsed it out, and filled it. Haymitch sputtered to life when I dumped it over his head.

"What was that for... oh." He blinked.

"Come on, we have to go."

"Go yourself, I need another few hours."

"It's afternoon, Haymitch. You can sleep on the train, I promise."

"I don't wanna sleep on the... train? What train?" he looked bewildered.

"I know where Katniss is," I spelled out for him. "I think she's in trouble. Let's-" I grabbed his arm and heaved, "-go."

I tried really hard not to panic. Katniss used to tell me that I was calmer than anyone she knew, even during tense situations I was the last she'd guess would panic. What she didn't know was that I probably panicked more than anyone, I just internalized it. It didn't take long to explain the letters to Haymitch, but he agreed it didn't look good. He settled into his compartment like a piece of luggage. He'd be useless until he got rid of his hangover. I propped myself on my cot, willing my body to still itself, and flipped through the broadcast channels. A replay of last night's Caesar Flickerman Show. Nope. A badly-drawn epic cartoon, small bodies with overembellished heads and eyes. Garbage. The last three Miss Panems arguing over this year's 'best dressed' award, and they looked like call girls themselves. Pass. A muttation talent contest. Gah. The Capitol still had no idea what entertained the rest of the country. I should have brought a book, but my mind was moving so fast, I'd probably read the first page eight times and absorb nothing.

I flipped to the news station, and sat upright like I'd been electrocuted. Staring back at me were mugshots of two faces I'd never forget, Plutarch and Beetee. My heart began to pound in my ears. I gripped a cushion, riding out the flashback, but kept my eyes trained on the screen.

_The criminals Plutarch Heavensbee, Communications Secretary to the President, and Beetee Silane, former weapons expert during the rebellion have been apprehended and secured at an undisclosed location to await trial. They are charged with multiple counts of consorting with an enemy of the State, and conspiracy to commit treason. President Paylor has issued a statement that the criminals will be treated with utmost fairness under the law, and that she is deeply saddened at the loss of faith in her former colleagues. In other news..._

The shiny figure of Beetee, piercing me through with a wide-gauge electrified wire. I didn't want to fathom what the Capitol torture techs had been doing to me when that hijack vision was induced the first time. And Plutarch? He was timing how long I could be held under a vat of some thick, foul-tasting industrial lubricant before I lost consciousness, reading that awful pocketwatch. "_We'll begin again at midnight_," his figure had said.

"Haymitch, Haymitch wake up!" I burst into his compartment, slamming the door behind me.

Haymitch sat bolt upright. "Can you be any less subtle," he droned, rubbing his eyes. "No, I don't think you can." He leaned back on his hands, and blinked at me.

"Plutarch and Beetee were just arrested. They're calling it treason," the words flew out. Haymitch's mouth hung open. I continued. "What's left of the rebellion crowd is dropping like flies. First Johanna, then Gale, and now Beetee and Plutarch? And has anyone heard from Enobaria? Who's next?"

"Wait, Johanna?"

I was floored. "You don't remember?"

"No..."

"Haymitch, she committed suicide last year."

"Oh..." he put his head in his hands. "I can't believe I forgot about that."

I went from exasperation to sympathy a few times in a few seconds, finally settling on the latter. "Well in your defense, you were too drunk to go to the funeral."

"Still no excuse," he groaned.

I sighed, trying to calm myself. "What if... it wasn't a suicide." I proposed. Haymitch looked up at me. "What if someone's targeting all of us?" My intuition often scared me to death. I sat down on the edge of the rigid mattress. "Honestly, key people from the rebellion are being convicted of crimes that don't make sense, or dying in weird ways. Maybe this is what that investigator has been so worried about, the reason he's been bothering us all for what we know? Maybe he's trying to make sure we're all still here."

Haymitch stared off into space, the way he sometimes did when the drinks started hitting him. When he wasn't inebriated, it was a sign that he was working things out. I waited.

"That's what he was talking about," he muttered to himself.

"I'm sorry?"

"When he called me about the murder... it was probably a month ago. He asked me if Gale had been replicating any of his old devices from the rebellion. He asked me that three times, like I hadn't answered properly. The he wanted to know if Gale had ever talked about regime changes within the current administration, and he asked me that one at least twice."

"What'd you tell him?"

"I told him that I hadn't seen or spoken to Gale since we all left Thirteen, and even then, I hardly talked to the guy. Staying out of y'all's affairs and whatnot. And..." he extended, "I told him that he was being a jerk and to leave the two of you alone. Didn't want him bothering Katniss with Gale talk... I know what he supposedly did tore her up."

"To say the least..." I muttered. "But why would he ask the same things so many times? Was he trying to trip you up? That's what Katniss thought when he repeated things."

"Now that I think about it, I'm not so sure. I did get the feeling he knew the answers to a lot of them, he just wanted to see what I knew, which was not much."

"It's as good a place as any to start," I said. "Know how to get ahold of him?"

~Katniss~

I hated this. Hated myself for endangering the Hawthornes, whom I loved dearly. I hated that I'd involved Rory, regardless of the fact that he willingly involved himself, and sickened by the fact that I was comforted by his involvement. I hated that he was so young and yet so responsible. Gale hadn't wanted that, he'd wanted Rory to stay young for as long as he could keep him that way, and I was actively participating in the destruction of his innocence. If anyone had been the betrayer, it was me.

Hazelle readied Vick and Posy for a day's worth of errands and activities in town, and Rory and I separately declined to join them, agreeing with a glance that they'd be in less danger in a crowded place than they would be hiding here.

"Does she suspect anything?" I asked after they'd turned at the end of the street.

"Mom always suspects," he told me. "But, no... not about this. She has it wrong." He dug his toe into the floorboard.

"What?" I prodded. Rory wasn't known for being bashful.

"I got lectured this morning."

"Huh?"

He sighed. "Mom thinks I like you. Like my brother did."

"That's ridiculous."

"S'what I told her. Can't see why she'd think so, she knows I loved Prim."

_Stab_. This should have been Prim's time to spend with Rory, not mine. She deserved it far more than I ever would. "Rory, we _have _been spending a lot of time alone together. Give your mom some credit for being intuitive."

"Yeah, I know." He was quiet for a minute. "But you're the big sister I grew up around. I love you like I love Posy. Having you here made me glad I could go easier on being 'man-of-the-house' for a while. And we missed you. Even though you think you made things worse, I'm glad you're here."

I punched his shoulder lightly, giving him a half-smile. "Thanks, Rory. Love you too."

_Knock, knock._

Rory and I looked at each other and froze. My heart thudded against my ribs. This was it. Rory put up his hand for me to stay where I was, he went to the peephole in the door and looked through.

"Uniforms," he mouthed.

"Weaver's?" I mouthed back. He shook his head. I tiptoed to the peephole.

They wore the gray and blue uniforms I recognized from the news reel. Two of them, one looked like one of Paylor's personal guards. The way his hair stuck out from under his military-issue cap was familiar.

"Paylor," I articulated. Rory nodded, and I slowly unlatched the door.

Relief washed over both of their faces. "Miss Everdeen, we received your message. If you and Mr. Hawthorne will come with us, we have a secure location for you to meet with President Paylor.

Rory and I looked at each other. "I can't leave my family," he said.

"Mrs. Hawthorne and the two other children are already under the protection of the New Republic Guard," the familiar uniform stated. "They'll meet you there. Please, there's little time. Your safe delivery to the President is of utmost priority."

Rory and I exchanged reassuring glances again, clasped hands, and we were ushered from the house. This was what we'd asked for, too late to take it back. We were fastwalked through the side yard and over the dividing hill, to the tree-sheltered clearing in the next lot where a hovercraft rested, waiting.

"Why didn't we hear this thing land?" Rory exclaimed.

The other uniform chuckled. "You can thank your brother for your stealthy exit. He was a heck of an engineer."

Another partial answer, a dozen new questions.

Strapped in, the hovercraft ride took the better part of a half hour. Upon our descent, I recognized the urban jungle that could only be the Capitol, and my stomach clenched. When they said a secure location, I hadn't thought it would be here. It made sense, but it didn't change the fact that we were arriving at a place I'd only ever associated with pageantry, control, and indifference to suffering. I forced myself to set those feelings aside. This wasn't about me, this was about everyone.

The restraints lifted, the outer door lowered, and we were escorted from the rooftop- wait, I knew this rooftop! I stopped short and the uniform ran into me and I fell, catching myself on my hands. Rory was there to help me up. "I'm sorry Miss, is there something wrong?" the guard apologized.

"Why are we at the training center?" I demanded.

The guard looked baffled, and I checked myself. Of course, only victors would have such strong associations with this place. "This is where your meeting is to be held, Miss. If you'll come with us?"

We were escorted through a set of double sliding doors, into the elevator where two additional uniforms waited. They appeared to be cutting no corners when it came to our protection. Normally I might relax a bit, but the memories drawn up by our location prevented it. I had to swallow back the oatmeal I'd eaten for breakfast... had it only been an hour since we were in the Hawthorne's kitchen? It felt like so much longer. Rory was worrying over my hands, now scraped from the fall. In my apprehension I hadn't noticed. One of the uniforms inserted a key into a space below the elevator buttons, and a panel slid aside, revealing more options. A combination was entered and we hurtled downward. Falling, falling, falling. I didn't remember the ride taking this long during either of my stays, so there must have been more levels far below those I'd visited.

I was suddenly aware that I didn't know exactly what I was going to tell Paylor, aside from the fact that there was some rogue faction bent on upsetting her authority. I had no solid proof, few names to offer and only a broken story to tell. At least Rory and his family were out of danger. I hoped to see them soon, to apologize for all this.

The elevator sunk to the end of its journey and stopped, causing my stomach to turn over again. I breathed through my nose to keep composure. When the doors opened, we stepped out, I felt the strange sensation of cloth across my face, and I was hurtled into darkness. _What's going on?_ I was being pinned at the arms so I kicked out with my legs. I made contact with something soft before my legs were being locked in vise-like arms. Fear gripped the pit of my stomach. _We walked into a trap! WIllingly!_ I heard Rory yelling all sorts of obscenities. _Rory!_

"Hold him!" I heard a uniform yell.

"Run, Rory!" I screeched.

Suddenly I heard a _zap _and something drop, hard. Rory's protests fell silent. "Rory! What did you do to him? Let me _go_!" I continued screaming, my throat raw from overuse. I could feel tears in the connections with the artificial tissue and I tasted blood, but I didn't care.

Then a blunt object connected with my rib cage and something cracked inside. The air rushed out of my lungs.

"She won't be that loud again," I heard someone snicker. "I thought my head was going to explode."

My arms were wrenched up and I was half-dragged, gasping, chest burning and stabbing, and then I was shoved sideways, my shin rammed into something hard and immovable. I landed on my left shoulder, tears springing to my eyes, blood on my tongue and air refusing to fill me. Something thudded next to me, and then a metallic _clank _ended the ordeal.

I could feel liquid pooling in my lungs, and I spasmed, not having enough air to cough. The pain in my chest ripped through me. The spasm forced my lungs open, and I took an agonizing breath. My hands fumbled with the cloth over my face and pulled it aside, while the shoulder I'd landed on protested angrily. More air came to me, excruciatingly, and colder. I resisted the overwhelming urge to cough, but lost that battle and spit up more blood, not much, but it couldn't be good. Tears clouded my eyes. I felt a dull thudding on my left shin, but it was an insect bite in comparison to my chest. I brought my fingers to feel my side, and the barest touch had me seeing stars.

I forced myself to roll onto my back, slowly. The pain sliced through my right side, blinding me again. At least from this position I could now look to my right where Rory lay unconscious, sprawled on the cold metal ground. I moved my fingers over the flat, frigid surface, taking in the feeling of rust, grasping for purchase but there was nothing to hold onto, no grates or studs, nothing to feel that would distract me from the pain. I grabbed the cloth from over Rory's head and pulled it away, clenching it in my fingers. He'd landed on his side as well, so maybe he hadn't hit his head, I thought. His chest rose and fell, suspending my worst fear of the moment and allowing me to move on to the next one. What had become of Hazelle, Vick and Posy? Where were they being held? Were they being so badly treated? Guilt washed over me, would have pulled me under if not for the pain's stirring, throbbing, and stabbing. I'd brought children into this. If Rory didn't make it out... no, I couldn't think of it.

I was so stupid. Of course Weaver would have his people positioned within the Capitol, if they were as close to gaining a foothold as I'd thought. We were being held right under Paylor's nose, and by people she evidently trusted. My thoughts went to Peeta. I hoped to the ends of my broken being that he would be safe from this. A thrill of despair flooded my soul and transcended the bitter wounds, and I knew. I'd never see Peeta again, never feel his warmth against me, never see his kind, blushing smile, never be enveloped by his softness or strength, never again taste his lips. I'd never hear him say the three words I so longed to hear again. The tears that silently fell were not for my pain, they were for him.

The metal door yanked open some time later. I was in no state to fight off whoever it was, or even move for that matter, without the agony crippling me. Rory was still out, but whoever the intruder was, I surmised they'd come for me, not him. So when the masked visitor pulled out a hypodermic needle, I took it's contents with no more protest than a whimper. And everything went black.


	11. Chapter 10

**Two updates in the same week! Aren't you lucky? Yes, you are. Now review, I demand it.**

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**Chapter 10**

~Peeta~

"Mrs. Hawthorne, we're sorry to barge in..." I began.

"Have you seen them?" the older woman cut me off, glanced frantically past me for a moment and then pulled me inside. Haymitch was close behind.

"Seen who?"

"Rory and Katniss!"

"We came looking for Katniss, what, she's not here?" My stomach knotted.

Hazelle Hawthorne shook her head agitatedly. "When we came back this afternoon they were gone.

"Mama!" Posy called from the front room window. "Mr. Weaver's coming!"

Mrs. Hawthorne became frantic. ""Oh no, this can't happen now..." she breathed.

"It's all right, Hazelle, I called him," Haymitch told her, leading her to a chair. I got the door just as Mr. Weaver raised his fist to knock.

"Right on time," he swept inside.

"What have you done with my son?" Hazelle demanded.

"Calm yourself, Mrs. Hawthorne," Weaver spoke calmly but seriously. "Contrary to popular opinion around here, I'm not the enemy."

"Then where are they? Do you know something?" I questioned.

"The elder Mr. Hawthorne and Miss Everdeen were apprehended by a Guard detachment this morning, quite a lot sooner than I'd anticipated," he said rather nonchalantly, referring to a flat black tablet he held. Text streamed across its glossy surface. "The boy was just collateral damage, I'm afraid. The official word is that they will be charged in tandem with Mr. Heavensbee and Mr. Silane. I have an operative on the inside who may be able to give me a location where they're being held, but it's going to take time."

"Wait, Katniss is going to be charged with treason? Why? She's done nothing!" I exploded. Fear gripped me more grievously than any amount I'd faced since the hijacking. A treason charge was always followed by a death sentence. The trial was just a formality, a show of fairness in a post-dictatorial system struggling through its infancy. "We have to do something," I fought to sound rational, but it was hopeless. "Do you have a plan?"

Weaver shot a disbelieving, even irritated glare in my direction, then looked back to his tablet as he spoke. "My _plan_ involved gaining cooperation from those involved, namely Mrs. Hawthorne, Miss Everdeen, Mr. Abernathy," he offhandedly indicated toward Haymitch, "and a number of others in order to turn a certain government plot on its head before this kind of thing happened." Condescension dripped from his words. "If I'd been afforded such cooperation, this unfortunate turn of events may have been avoided."

"We didn't know anything, you pompous, arrogant..." Haymitch lunged for Weaver, shouting obscenities, and I almost let him hit the man, my own fists balling at the insulting assessment of this dire situation, but I put myself between them.

"Haymitch, that's not going to help," I asserted, holding him back. Haymitch breathed forcefully, his nostrils flaring, but contained himself. His reluctance was palpable. I spoke, still staring Haymitch down. "Haymitch and Katniss told you everything they know, and I stand by their honesty. But if they did know things, they may not have told you, considering your handling of this case," I jabbed. "The truth is, none of us have any answers for you. At least not to the things you've asked." Haymitch backed off at this, and when I was satisfied that he wouldn't try that again, I turned to Mr. Weaver. His eyes were considering me.

"Fair enough, Mr. Mellark. I was beginning to gather as much."

I snorted. "You believe me, but not them?"

Weaver cocked his head to one side. "You forget, I helped to assess your condition after your arrival in District Thirteen."

It was the way he turned his head. The memory hit me so suddenly I didn't have time to grip anything. His face multiplied, swirled, looked down at me while I struggled in the restraints. I wanted to wipe that smirk off his tilted face more than anything. The way he'd walk around me, writing things on his clipboard, talking to the nurses about me like I wasn't there. Then the needles came. The medicines burned, made me shake, like the tremors...

I was suddenly alert again, but I was slightly drowsy. The awareness of Haymitch's arms holding me to him, my right shoulder mashed into his chest, and Weaver... he was shoving his fingers into my neck and left ribcage. Pressure points, I remembered. "You can let go, I'm under control," I said.

Hazelle had backed into a corner of the kitchen with Posy and Vick huddled in her arms. I felt terrible. "I apologize, Mrs. Hawthorne." Her eyes were wide, apprehensive. She hissed at the children to go upstairs and stay there.

"That wasn't what I expected, Mr. Mellark, you're remarkably more docile now," Weaver assessed.

"New meds," I told him. "So what makes you believe me and not Haymitch or Katniss?"

Weaver raised an eyebrow. "Because your captivity and the circumstances surrounding made you practically incapable of lying."

He was right. The realization hit me, but as soon as it did, lost its importance. I shook it off. "What are we going to do?"

"And what's this talk of a government plot?" Haymitch interjected.

"One thing at a time." Weaver punched a few keys on his tablet. "Two of my agents are on their way here now; one will stay and protect Mrs. Hawthorne and the children," he gestured to Hazelle, still wringing her hands in the corner, "and the other is coming with me to plan our next move."

"We're coming with you," I insisted.

Weaver rolled his eyes. "I saw you in both Games, Mr. Mellark. Forgive me, but you weren't exactly a fighter."

Haymitch towered over Weaver menacingly. "Now you listen here," he said, jabbing the smaller man with his index and middle fingers, "you talk about what could have been avoided, well there are four lives in grave danger right now, and the way I see it, this could have been avoided if you'd pulled your head outta your rear and clued us in. The kid says we're coming, so get used to it."

Weaver actually dared to look irritated, but the was trumped by his fear. He nodded, yieldingly.

A hand on my back startled me, and I turned. Mrs. Hawthorne's eyes met mine, fearful and pleading. "Please find my son, bring him back to me," she begged.

The enduring love I have for Katniss, the unconditional element of it, reflected back in her eyes. "I'll do everything I can."

~Katniss~

I woke, shivering.

_Drip... Drip... Drip..._

Cold.

Humid cold.

Rust... I smelled it. Like silt and blood. My shoulders strained, pulled back, aching. Bit by bit, my head raised, eyes opened. Dark, corroded metal walls. The deep whirring of a generator, pulled me back to the hovercraft...

the rooftop... the elevator...

_The assault_.

_Rory_.

My head whipped around, the swell of panic bringing on a surge of lightheadedness. The sticky residue of blood on the back of my tongue. My ribs siezed, but were braced somehow, under a thin, wet shirt. This wasn't my shirt... mine had been brown, this one was white. No pants, no shoes... cold, wet rust under my feet. My hands... clasping each other, but turned backward. A draft in the room. I turned my head more slowly. A metal door. Everything here was metal. That inane dripping.

Rory wasn't here. I perished the thought that he was someplace worse.

"What do you want from me?" my voice was ragged. Maybe no one could hear.

Seconds passed. A feeling of spiders crept along my fingers. I tried to shake it off, but it inched up to my elbows, moving faster. I felt a tingling in my shoulders, then a burning sensation raced through my chest, down through my legs and to my feet, and then I was shivering violently, but not from cold. The intensity rose, I couldn't move. Panic took over as every joint in my body felt on the verge of snapping. I could see red. Then it stopped, and I sucked in a breath. The waves of discomfort ebbed, but my heart was pounding furiously. The room spun and turned ninety degrees, and I wondered why it wouldn't right itself until I realized my head had fallen to one side. My neck was slack, my spine had become thread.

"Why are you doing this?" I slurred.

It began again... harder this time. Like flames licking under my skin, crackling and popping on its way through me. I was rigid, my joints screaming. I remembered the tracker jacker stings from the arena, I'd take those instead, and be forever indebted to the relief it would bring. My eyes, bulging from the sensation, couldn't produce tears, I couldn't scream. My tongue swelled and blocked my throat, I couldn't breathe. My heart would explode. Couldn't breathe. On fire. Out of air.

The attack ended suddenly. My heart stuttered, then thudded in a disjointed rhythm. I sucked in air, the sudden relief was cold... too cold. I cried out. My skin was on fire, my bones ached desperately. I couldn't lift my head.

"Please... stop..." I breathed.

Time passed. Other pain came later, in slow waves, like intense soreness and aggravated by the slightest movement, even by breathing. It felt like hours went by. I shivered from the pain, or the cold, or both... and my sensitivity to both wickedly intensified. I was so tired. _Why was this happening? What did they want? What about Rory, his family... oh please, please let them be spared this. _The thought of them brought tears to mingle with my sweat. I never imagined I could withstand this level of sustained agony. I'd have done anything for the slightest bit of relief, and my body must have agreed, rewarding me for my trouble with blissful unconsciousness.

The side of my head felt to suddenly explode, jolting me to wakefulness. The sting that came from the blow was such that my eyes wouldn't focus, there was a face before me but I couldn't see it. The pain from before was still there, dogging me. A flash of wonder for what time had passed came abruptly. Hours? Days? Longer? Would I remember if I had? Did anything else happen? I tensed, shrinking from what form the pain would take. If they were done with me, I'd be dead. Or at least back in a cell.

My arms weren't tied but hung limply at my sides. "Who... who's in charge here?" I squeaked.

A sharp hand came across, devastating my other cheek. My neck wrenched from the force of it, and I cried out, my voice sounding more unlike me. Then I was being heaved up and dragged, my feet struggling to support me and failing, I was being pulled too fast. I fell forward with a splash. Couldn't breathe... I threw my hands forward to push me back, but the hands that dragged me were on my shoulders, my neck, my head, holding me down. My hands, weak and slick, grasped pitfully at my restrainers. My lungs screamed for air and started to expand from dire need, and the water came in through my nose. I was choking. And then I knew, this was how I would die.

My head was yanked back and I was thrown to the ground. My lungs were already heaving, spewing fluid from my mouth and nose. My arms trembled, splayed on either side of me, trying to hold me up as I coughed and sputtered. The pain in my chest was stabbing, conflicting with my desire for air. Stars danced before my eyes.

"Katniss?"

I was somewhat warmer. My head hurt, my eyes hurt... everything hurt. Something shifted underneath me.

"Can you hear me?" The voice whispered.

"Mmm..." was all I could manage.

"I'm so sorry... so sorry..." the voice... I knew that voice... repeated, again and again.

A hand on my face. I winced, couldn't focus. My eyes gave up and closed again.

I was stiff. Tangled. Dark, so dark. Heavy. Restrained, possibly. Tried to move, then stopped. Moving was a bad idea. Moving brought on pain. I blinked, strained to see, then thought better of it. Didn't want to announce my wakefulness for fear of what came next. But I was warm now, that was different. My tongue came out to lick my lips. I was so thirsty.

I heard breathing. A warm, humid draft near my neck. I went rigid- a bad idea since it brought on a series of escaped whimpers- screwing my eyes to the side to see what it was. Maybe a predator, some twisted, new form of torture. It must have sensed my awareness, because it... groaned? The mass I was tangled in, a web of harsh fabric, moved around me.

"Katniss? You awake?"

_Gale?_

He shifted, moved to look down at me. I started to sigh, but my chest siezed and the anticipated relief became agony. It was Rory. He was still safe.

"Did... they hurt you?" I managed.

He shook his head. His face betrayed so many emotions at once, but the one that surfaced the most was worry.

"What happened..." I whispered.

He shook his head again, more slowly. "I woke up and you weren't here... it took a while to remember. Someone came, took me to a room. It had a television. I..."

I waited. "What..."

His expression moved between his own dispair and the fiery rage I'd only ever seen in his older brother, and back again. "I didn't see who they were. They asked me things. Said there would be consequences if I didn't answer. Then they put you on the screen..."

I blinked. My head throbbed. He'd seen. They made him watch.

"I'm so, so sorry," he begged. "I didn't know the answers. I didn't know what they thought I knew. I'm sorry, Katniss, I'm so sorry..."

They made him _watch_. The thought of it sickened me. I wanted to hold him, to comfort him as I knew his brother would have, as I should, but my arms were dead weights. My heart thudded unevenly as it tried to respond to the sudden surge of anger. _No_, I told myself. _Your focus is Rory. You have to give him the best chance to get out of here_. I forced myself to swallow everything I was feeling, real and percieved, and gathered my voice.

"Rory, stop. Stop crying."

He blinked and sniffled, looking down at me, failure etched in his features.

"I need you to be brave. This isn't your fault, and I'm so sorry you're here. I mean that. But right now I need your help."

He nodded.

I sighed, and it brought an aged stab to my ribs. "First, please tell me what the damage is."

He swallowed. "You mean, what they did to you?" He took my silence as an affirmative. "Um... your face is pretty bad, there are bruises all up and down your arms and legs, one big one on your shin. Someone taped your ribs, I felt it through your shirt, you were soaked and so cold, I tried to warm you up as best I could." He hesitated. "They... they threw you back in here in just a shirt and underwear... so I don't know if there was more than what I saw..." he trailed off.

I got his meaning immediately, and my mind raced to that part of my anatomy. It felt untouched, despite what else had been done to me. "I think we can rule out heinous violations." I swallowed, remembering my dry throat. "Is there any water?"

"Yeah," he drifted away from me for a few seconds, returning with a plastic cup. "They brought some bread too, if you're up for it." He helped prop me against him, sensing my need and responding without question. The water was more of a relief than anticipated. He brought bits of bread to my lips. It hurt to chew, a small price to pay for the fuel that would keep us alive. "Thanks, Rory."

"Sssst."

"What?" I asked him.

I felt him shrug. "Not me."

"Sssst... here."

"Hmmm?" Rory leaned left, to the wall.

"Hear me?"

"Yes...?" Rory whispered back.

"Katniss?"

This roused me. "Who..."

"A friend. Are you really Katniss Everdeen?" the low voice was hopeful.

"How do you know me?"

"There isn't a citizen alive who doesn't," he whispered excitedly. "I didn't mean to eavesdrop, I just heard your friend waking you earlier. My cellmate isn't going to believe this. Hold on, I'll get him."

I heard a muted shuffling. The wall I had been speaking to, the corner actually, was slightly warped, pulled away from where it should have adjoined the intersecting beam. It was only a sliver, not enough to see through, but just enough to exchange conversation. Rory carefully scooted us a bit closer. I clamped down on his forearm when the shifting reawakened the pain from my injuries.

The shuffling returned. "Katniss?"

I knew that voice. "Plutarch?"

A slight chuckle reinforced his identity. I heard his cellmate shush him. "I'm sorry to laugh, there's no time. You shouldn't be here. I imagined it wouldn't be long before you were targeted as well."

"Do you know why we're here?"

"Oh yes." Plutarch's voice was laden with defeat.

I swallowed. "Tell me."

~Peeta~

I struggled. The insanity that rose up to beat its head against my right nature couldn't distract me from the only thing I couldn't bear to think about, but it was the sole reason for this conflict. I suppose this is what one would call a vicious cycle, though the only thing more vicious was my intention toward whoever or whatever had taken her. Katniss was her own person in a way no one else was, but in this element, she was _mine_. And I wouldn't permit anyone to harm her. If they did... the desire to harm them, or worse, wasn't fueled by the torturous venom sessions I'd endured, the ones that took a part of me I would always fight to earn back. It was driven by my oath to protect her life with my own, the one I'd sworn the day I first saw her and which multiplied in purity and diligence every day since. This desire to injure was my own, and I would fulfill it, if it meant bringing her home, safe and sound. Even if it meant losing myself.

I was beginning to see just how complex and efficient this organization of Weaver's was. Well, it wasn't _his_ organization I'd gathered, but he had become deeply involved and critical to its inner-workings. I was only fed limited information; we sailed over to another area in Two and took on six uniformed soldiers. I thought I'd seen the mountain range through the window before, but I shrugged it off before it had the chance to trigger anything. Then it was off to some remote part of Nine. Haymitch snored, gripping the armrests in his slumber. Hovercraft travel wasn't for him. His sobriety was a personal choice for once, but it hardly agreed with him. He spent the majority of the trip either asleep or deep in conversation with Weaver, and sitting across the aisle from me, I couldn't hear their whispers over the engine. It was safe to assume they were discussing the best way to exclude me from any sort of rescue read his tablet. I dozed off accidentally, jerking awake when we landed. Two of the soldiers disembarked and three more boarded, towing along two heavy plastic crates. One of the crew passed out rations. My stomach lurched at the thought of filling it, but Haymitch's barking led me to chew on the edge of a granola bar. We landed in Five midday. A blast of hot wind and dust blew in through the cargo door, and when the passengers and gear had been stowed and the craft refueled, we were off again. My heart pounded every time we came in for a landing, anticipating some progress toward finding Katniss. They weren't going to tell me anything. We _were _headed for the Capitol next, after all. Couldn't have the mentally unstable one causing trouble.

We finally landed somewhere underground, the iris-like steel roof swirling shut under the dusk as we disembarked. Weaver strode down a series of hallways, Haymitch and I on his heels. A rush of hot wind blasted through a set of mechanical doors, and I found myself stepping on a darkened subway platform. My hands balled in fists, recalling the shiny bullet train where we'd... no, it wasn't real. It hadn't happened that way. Haymitch took me by the arm and steered me on board. I gripped the nearest handrail with determined intensity, assuring myself that it would bring me closer to her safety. I'd endure a lifetime of continuous episodes, flashbacks, tremors, even the torture that was the cause of my instability, if it brought her safely home.

The train car lurched to a stop and deposited us onto a more brightly lit platform, and Weaver was off and walking again. He stopped in some sort of command center, handed his tablet to a woman with red hair, and tapped some buttons on a console. A street map appeared, and he muttered to himself.

"Well?" I finally demanded.

"Hold on," he said calmly, eyes on the screen. The red-haired woman reappeared, handing his tablet back wordlessly. "Here." He tapped a point. "Of course, that makes sense."

"What does?" Haymitch blurted out.

"My team has been narrowing down their location since we left. It looks like they're being held at the training center."

My heart thudded. I saw her, batting her dark lashes, daring me to throw the heavy barbells around. The big one, Cato... it missed him by inches, his eyes went murderous with rage. He and the careers cornered me later in the elevator...

"_Not real... not real..._" I was shaking my head, Haymitch had his hands on my shoulders.

"I rest my case," Weaver's collected voice broke through; he was gesturing in my direction. I was right, they had been discussing me.

"Kid, they should probably handle this," Haymitch directed softly at me.

"They're going now?"

"Can't afford to wait. It's been too long already," said Weaver.

"I have to go. I have to find her!" I insisted.

"Not if it's going to bring on something that could compromise the mission," Haymitch reminded me. I knew what he was getting at. The barely successful attack on the Capitol during the rebellion... the capture of President Snow... my assault on Mitchell... the conflict within had snuck up on me again.

"Look at me," he instructed. "That place, I know how it affected you. You have some idea what it might drag up. Weaver told me on the ride here that this might be a possibility. I agree with him that we should stay put. Let the professionals do their jobs."

"No Haymitch..."

"Peeta listen to me," he demanded. It was rare that he used my name, and it jabbed at me just hard enough to break off the panicked protest. "If things don't go according to plan your being there could make things much more dangerous for her. You're not going with them."

Weaver was standing there, waiting. "The strike team is leaving within the hour. They'll be wearing hidden cameras that will transmit their progress. You're free to watch from here."

A team was going to rescue her. A _team_. Comprised of who, exactly? Soldiers? Tacticians? Better-trained than I, but they wouldn't care like I did. They didn't love her. Their decisions wouldn't be based on doing everything they could to bring her back; if things didn't go well, I doubted they'd be required to lay down their lives for her. I swallowed the bile that rose in my throat. Haymitch was still gripping my shoulders, I noticed. It was the only thing holding me here.

"Somewhere more private might be better," he suggested.

He made me sit. Someone brough a pitcher of water. The door was loud when it closed. The monitors flickered. Haymitch said some things to me, but it was hard to retain them for the pounding in my ears. One hand was still on my shoulder, probably to keep me upright. I couldn't feel my pulse anymore.

"We're ready down here," a distorted voice came through the speakers.

Static. A pause. The monitors came to life, assorted views of the team boarding a transport. Weaver's voice came through. "You have a go."


	12. Chapter 11

**Special thanks to Phillydilly31 for pointing out that I had Anonymous Reviews turned off. It's been fixed. Fire at will. :)**

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**Chapter 11**

~Katniss~

My head swam. The pieces fit. This just wasn't possible. Plutarch explained, I listened. Rory stayed silent. My eyes closed, desperately trying to draw myself into wakefulness; this was just one of my absurd nightmares, the ones that had me screaming my head off and Peeta running to reassure me. I'd wake up and he'd be there, whispering that everything was fine. I'd be home in my bed. Rory would be safe with his family. Even the part about Gale being dead, that would be part of the dream too. Everything was too unbearable, inconceivable It couldn't be real.

I didn't really hear the muted words after that, the volume escalating. When Plutarch screamed, my nestled dream shattered. It was a sick, imminent wail I'd never recovered from hearing the first time, the fifth time, the fiftieth time. A startled cry escaped me. Rory instantly had his hand over my bruised and swollen mouth. A dull, cracking thud echoed between my ears. Then the sound of rubbing sandpaper... _they were dragging his body away_. There was nothing left but our shallow, terrified breathing.

I felt dead inside when he slowly peeled his fingers away. I had no words. We weren't getting out of this. I hadn't accepted it, but I knew. My tongue wouldn't work, I had things I wanted to say but it just wouldn't cooperate. So I cried.

Rory was stiff behind me, his arms around me like vises. He deserved a kind life, and this was so unfair. He would die because I'd been wrong. His brother died because I hadn't seen. Johanna... Enobaria... Gale... Beetee... Plutarch... they'd all died because I hadn't been quick enough in realizing what I'd done. There was no apology or condolence that would prepare him for what was coming. I couldn't help him. I couldn't help anyone. The war had been lost after all. The Mockingjay had sung for both sides.

I wondered if Prim would be waiting for me, on the other side. If she knew... she'd never forgive me.

~Peeta~

Haymitch tried to talk to me, but I wasn't paying attention. He could have been narrating the mission for all I knew. All I could do to keep from launching from my seat and succumbing to a devastating tremor was to remember that I could be seeing her again. Soon. So my eyes were glued to the grid of screens before me. They numbered four, rolling up to a side door of the once revered training center, dressed in the uniforms of the Republic Guard, a detail I wasn't clear on and one Haymitch may have explained, but again, I wasn't listening to him.

There was plenty of chatter from the control room, Weaver's voice came clear through the speakers and into the earpieces of the recovery team. The four carried two cargo cases between them, were permitted passage when the first flashed an ID badge, and proceeded directly to the elevator. I wondered helplessly how trustworthy Weaver's intelligence was, as it could just as well lead Katniss' only hope of rescue down the wrong path and into an ambush. My fingers dug into the seat cushion, all the way to the rubbery foam innards. One was pressing the elevator buttons, plugging in a computer, while the others opened one of the cases and distributed guns. I'd assumed they'd be armed somehow, but seeing them wielding automatic weapons made this even scarier. Haymitch's hand tightened on my shoulder. My head throbbed.

It was chaos the moment the elevator door opened. Shots burst forth, ringing out as loud and distorted as they had been in the city circle two years ago. The flashback split in my mind, hauling me back to that terrible place while keeping me firmly planted in this one, like both experiences were running simultaneously. The team broke up, just as the one before had, when we reached the end of the line. The corridor of armed guards translated to the gauntlet of explosive traps; the rows of metal doors to the lines of closed shops we'd raided, the homes we'd hidden inside. My heart jumped into my throat... prison cells.

It had taken me this long to make the connection, but in that time, the tremor had subsided. There was a wide smear, distinctly blood, leading into the cell the second camera had entered. He backed out, I could hear his voice but the words were garbled. He kicked the next door open. I saw a flash of two dirty, huddled people before his camera went fuzzy. My eyes moved to another screen, the guy behind the second camera saw him lift a body into his arms, and then moved past him to gather the next prisoner.

_It was Rory_. He was fighting, the fourth camera went to help subdue him. Which meant...

My eyes flashed back to the second screen, the fuzzy picture was definitely of someone being carried. _Katniss_. "It's her!" I breathed. "Why can't I see?"

Weaver's voice came clear over the speakers. "Primary and secondary objectives have been obtained. Proceed to next phase. Teams Two through Six, you have a go."

"Haymitch!" I nearly bounded from the couch, but his grip on my shoulder stopped me.

"I know," he said to me. "I know."

My eyes moved frantically among the screens, but the second had been permanently corrupted and the others were focused on their own agendas; Three and Four maintained a subdued Rory between them while the first, who must have been the technician, held out what looked like a flimsy headpiece, and a few seconds later a fifth monitor sprang to life. I offhandedly guess they had picked up their insider. The tech disconnected his computer from the second case and left it, ordering the others forward. The elevator ride was shorter, they got off and crossed some kind of storage room. I saw tiny glimpses from the others as their views swept past Two, and in his arms I saw bare legs and feet. My mind wouldn't let me linger on what that meant. As long as she was alive. That's all that mattered, she was alive and safe.

Stairs. A catwalk, and more stairs. A mechanical rolltop door, and then darkness. Night vision must have kicked in, everything became neon green on a black backdrop. The team wasn't barking instructions anymore, they'd fallen silent. Five appeared to be in the lead. One had fallen behind Three and Four, and while Four had the best view of Two's back, it was still impossible to see her. There were more stairs, going down this time, to a dead end. One had the computer out again, plugged into some panel, and a few seconds later the wall split and slid apart. A narrow corridor, a drop down, then a hallway with raised sides... and a... subway car? Yes, it was the end of a car like the one we'd ridden in earlier. My heart thudded in my throat. She was closer than I could have hoped, I thought.

The lights came up. There were others to meet the team, a few looked like medics. One went to the control room in front where other techs were operating controls, but I was fixed on the blurry one, which had just deposited its load and came in clear after turning away. All four screens lurched as the car began to move, then the monitors went black. I went rigid.

"Calm down, this is part of the plan," Haymitch reassured me.

"What? You knew it was going to go down like this? Why didn't you tell me?" I didn't think I'd still be beside myself, knowing Katniss was on her way to safety. My whole body shook, but not from an oncoming tremor.

"I just got done saying that a few minutes ago," he told me patiently. "Were you listening to anything I was telling you?"

I couldn't respond. I couldn't think. My mind was tricking me again, like always. "Is this real?" I begged.

He nodded. "This is real. She's on her way back here. She's in good hands, from what I hear. We'll go see her when she's settled in; the route they're on takes about twenty minutes."

I wriggled away from his grasp and stood, wringing my hands and pacing. "I want to go. I want to wait for her. I need to see that she's all right. I have to." I must have looked like a madman, but I didn't care.

Haymitch stood, but didn't try to stop my aggravated movements. "You can't go out there like this, kid. You'll scare people. They're not gonna let you in there to see her till you're calm."

I swallowed hard, willed myself to be still. I think it was the lack of control that was making me this way' Dr. Aurelius had said part of my therapy was in letting go of the things I couldn't change. So while my head screamed in violent protest, I put my hands over my ears and squeezed my eyes shut. I was no good to Katniss if I was a wreck. I couldn't do anything about the time it took to get her here. I couldn't have forseen her being taken. I had no control over what may have happened while she was there. I had to forgive myself for what happened before she left; it was possible that I wasn't the only reason she did. I _did_, however, have the ability to be there for her when she got here, if she wanted, and I would fight like mad to keep her from harm again. My breathing evened, I blinked to readjust to the fluorescent lighting, and I smoothed my hair down. "I'm fine now. I want to wait for her."

Haymitch studied for a minute, then went to the wall and punched the intercom button. "We're ready."

The red-haired woman took down a series of industrial hallways to a viewing room of sorts, overlooking a makeshift infirmary. She whispered something to Haymitch and he nodded, and then she left us to wait. My hands worried over my arms, the goosebumps rose from the sterile chill of the room, but no more than from my anxiety. "What did she say?" I asked, as calmly as I could manage.

"That... things are as they expected," he said cautiously.

My stomach flip-flopped. "What does that mean?" The edge had returned to my voice.

Haymitch gripped my arms. "Hold it together. You didn't hear anything I told you when the raid started, did you?" he kept his voice level.

I shook my head. "I know you were talking but... Haymitch please, tell me."

He sniffed and smoothed his stubble, something he did when trying to explain something he didn't like. "It looks like she was interrogated. To what extent I don't know. She and Rory are alive, that's what's important. They can't get to her here."

"Interrogated?" my voice rose. The shaking started, as did the swirling in my head. I felt my arms being squeezed harder. I had to focus. Through clenched teeth I shuddered a sigh. "You mean tortured, don't you." It wasn't a question. Haymitch just looked away.

Below us, a mechanical door swept aside and they were wheeling in a gurney. I was subconsciously yanked to the window, my palms pressed to the shatterproof glass.

Peripherally, I saw Rory, sitting up on his bed. He would be fine, it seemed. But my eyes, they were locked on Katniss. And I'd never seen her look so bad before. Purple bruises covered every inch of her skin. There were tubes and wires hooked up all over her, bags of fluid swung above her bed as they wheeled her up to a series of monitors. They all flashed simultaneously and started recording. Her eyes... they were open. Blinking. One of the medics, a woman, was talking to her. Katniss nodded, and then the female medic administered something from a syringe. My beloved's eyes closed.

"What are they doing?" I whispered.

"Taking care of her, I imagine," came Haymitch's reply.

They were lifting her shirt, putting metal patches high on her bruised right shoulder and left side. Simultaneously, all the medics lifted their hands from her, and one pressed a flashing button. Katniss' body convulsed once, then went limp again. The monitors went flat. I felt the blood drain from my face. "They're killing her!" I threw myself at the window, pounding the glass and screaming. Hands came up to restrain me, and I wrenched myself away. "No!" I went for the door handle, the inner door that led down metal stairs into the medical bay. It wouldn't budge. "Katniss!" I wrenched it with all my might. Nothing. My fists hit the window. "Stop! Stop!" They made her convulse again, and the monitors picked up her pulse. The medics went to work on her again, removing the patches and tending to her wounds.

My hands fell to my sides, just as Haymitch brought his hands to my arms again. He was saying things, trying to talk my down I imagine, but the words didn't reach my brain. I was transfixed on the girl with the bruises. A swelling of rage gradually replaced the panic. I resolved to end whoever had done this to her.

Rory was being tended to behind a curtain. There was a medic pumping an inflatable cuff on his arm, to take blood pressure, I thought. He looked worn, but none the worse for it, relatively untouched, actually. He looked up to the window and his eyes found mine, and he waved, halfheartedly. _He must know, who did this_, I decided.

The woman who worked on Katniss handed something to her associate and came up the stairs. She swiped a card in a slot above the handle and the door beeped, allowing her to manipulate the handle. Haymitch was holding me back. He was surprisingly strong when sober.

"I'm not going to do anything," I turned my head to mutter to him, and his hands dropped.

"Mr. Mellark?" The medic addressed me.

"How is she?" I demanded, and immediately regretted my tone.

"I'm Dr. Raylin," she introduced herself. "Your wife's been through a lot, but her injuries aren't severe. It appears she was tended-to a bit during her captivity. She's going to be fine."

_I wish she were my wife._ "Fine?" I bellowed. I was feeling less like myself by the minute. "She hardly looks fine! Look at her! If she's so fine why did you have to shock her?" Haymitch's hand was on my shoulder again. I struggled to regain composure.

"That was necessary to return her heart to a normal rhythm. She was in a tachycardic state during her initial assessment; Mr. Hawthorne indicated she'd been like that for the better part of a day. We'll need to monitor her for a few days. The bruising is extensive but mostly superficial. She has a few cracked ribs and her lungs were grazed, but not punctured. Her concussion is disorienting at most. We're giving her something for the pain and to dissipate the bruising."

I nodded, attempting to mask my discomfort at the description. "I'm sorry for my behavior," I told her. "Can I see her?"

"It's quite all right, and yes, we're going to move her to another room in a few minutes. We'll bring you to her then." She hurried back through the door, leaving me with a touch of relief and a hundred new questions.

"Haymitch, start talking. I need to know what's going on."

"You gonna listen this time?" he asked, skeptically.

I breathed a sigh. "Yes."

~Katniss~

It hurt, being carried, yanked into a stranger's arms, Rory yelling, his voice growing further and further away. I didn't have the strength or voice to protest. It was cold again. I let my eyes close, drowning out the chaos and waiting for my death. Then I was being placed on something soft, and the lights overhead, the concerned faces. Something was moving under me. "Rory..." I croaked.

"He's here," a woman said. I was palpated and prodded, and I tried not to cry out but a few whimpers escaped. The woman said her name, I didn't remember it... she said she was sorry, every time I made a sound. She said I would be okay. But none of us were okay. I had to tell... someone. Who could I tell? Who was still around, who could do something to stop this?

Moving again. I was warmer. The woman was explaining something to me, she said they had to make me sleep to fix me, and asked if that was all right. I found it a little funny, no doctor had ever asked me if it was okay if they did something to me, they just did it. So I nodded. And they made me sleep.

I was still warm. I knew I was dreaming, because Prim was there. She was skipping, a basket in one hand, a fistful of dandelions in the other, her blouse untucked from her skirt, braids bouncing down her back. I didn't remember seeing her so happy in life. Maybe this is what she could enjoy, wherever she existed now. Maybe I wasn't dreaming, maybe I really had died, and finally had what I'd hoped to find, if that were the case. But when I called to her, she didn't answer, just kept skipping away from me, through the meadow. That's when I saw him.

He looked older. More natural. Less Capitol.

"Gale," I breathed.

He smiled. "You know my secret," he said.

"I do." I paused. Well, if it were possible to pause in dreams. They say the average dream lasts only minutes, but can feel like far more. So a pause would take relatively little time at all, if any. "I just don't know who to tell. Can anything be done?"

He leaned in to me. "Tell everyone. It's the only way." He pressed his lips to my cheek, and backed away, turning to run after Prim. She giggled and dodged him, letting loose a shower of dandelion fluff.

My eyelids were heavy, but I didn't want to sleep anymore.

"Prim..." it just came out, like I was trying to pull her with me into wakefulness.

"Katniss?" I knew that voice. But it was impossible, he couldn't be here. A warm hand touched mine, held it carefully. "I'm here, sweetheart." I heard fabric shift, felt my hair being brushed back and I blinked to dissipate the haze. When his pale features came into view, my breath quickened. My tongue came out to lick my dry, chapped lips, and a plastic straw was instantly held to my mouth. I drank deeply, sputtering as a few drops went down the wrong way in my haste. "Shh," he soothed me, wiping the few drops of water that dribbled down my chin.

"Peeta..." I rasped. "What... are you..."

"I'm sorry, so sorry," he explained gently. "Please don't be angry with me."

My breaths made me lightheaded, or perhaps it was whatever was dripping into my veins through the tangle of tubes and wires attached to my arms. I gulped and tried again. "How are you here?"

He blushed, pink rising on his cheeks and ears. "I found the letters. We came looking for you, when you weren't at the Hawthornes' Haymitch called that investigator. They found you and brought you back here."

My heart plummeted. "Hazelle, the kids!"

His hand pressed into my shoulder, keeping me from rising. "They're fine. Haymitch is calling Mrs. Hawthorne now. Everyone's fine." HIs hand went back to my hair, his thumb brushing my forehead.

I sighed in simultaneous relief and dispair at his words. "Not everyone," my voice came out surprisingly more even than I thought I was able. "Beetee and Plutarch... they're dead."

"What?"

"Enobaria too..." I continued. I had to get this out while I was still level. "Johanna wasn't a suicide. And Gale..."

"Hold on, love. Hold that thought, just a minute," he said quickly, dropping my hand and leaving my view, calling into the hallway. He was back a few seconds later with Haymitch.

"Well look who's awake, " my mentor stated obviously.

"Sweetheart, tell us everything," Peeta retook my hand.

"Yes, Miss Everdeen, tell us." It was that investigator. He seemed less abrasive than before.

"You..." I squinted.

"It's important you tell us everything you know, Katniss." His voice was bordering on gentle. He pulled up a chair on the other side. "Please."

I looked to Peeta, and he nodded. "Okay," I began. "Gale saw things. He and Plutarch, and Beetee sometimes... they started to suspect things weren't right. Troop movements, requisitioning of more guard squads. Enobaria noticed it first, called Gale. She disappeared a week later. Then last year Johanna... she and Gale were..." no, I wasn't going to say it. "They killed her, made it look like a suicide. It was to keep him quiet or scared, I don't know. But he'd already told Beetee, who told Plutarch..."

"Told them what?" the investigator prodded.

I swallowed again. "He thought they were trying to bring back the Peacekeepers. Deploying troops to control the districts under the pretense of rebuilding. Calling them the Republic Guard and changing the uniform didn't fool Gale like it did everyone else. He'd trained and armed so many of them already, when his suspicions became known, his usefulness wore out and they killed him." My face crinkled suddenly, the realization of what I'd just said hitting me somehow harder than the beatings I endured. Peeta was still at my ear... he'd never left... soothing me. I steadied myself and continued.

"Beetee and Plutarch knew what Gale knew, so they were targeted next. Plutarch told me everything right before they..." the flashback of his screams briefly pulled me away again.

"Right before they beat him to death..." another voice broke through. Rory had joined us, his face gray and drawn. He gripped a metal stand dangling a bag of fluid, his arm tethered to it with tubing. "He was in the next cell. We heard everything. Must've fallen asleep after, when we woke up that team was getting us out." Haymitch gave up his seat for the boy, moving to stand behind him. I reached out with my free hand and Rory took it, squeezing my fingers. Something unspoken passed between us, a kind of shared, painful relief. It was good to see him safe.

"I don't get it," Haymitch interjected. "We all fought so hard, were so unanimous in wanting the Peacekeepers disbanded. How can Paylor let this happen under her nose?"

"She didn't let it happen," I blurted out. "She's behind it."

Everyone's eyes were on me. Even Rory's, though he already knew. He'd heard everything that I had. Maybe his head was clearer at the time and he caught more, but he didn't appear to have it in him to explain, so I continued. "Plutarch had been digging into her past for quite some time. He was the one who discovered her secret, the one that explains why she thought she was entitled to succeed Snow. I can't believe, all that time I didn't see it. The pieces were right there."

"Succeed _Snow?_ You gonna clue us in, Sweetheart?" Haymitch was growing impatient.

I exhaled. "Layne Paylor is President Snow's daughter."


	13. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12**

~Peeta~

She couldn't have it right.

"What?" Haymitch expelled. "Well no, that makes perfect sense, actually." Everyone turned to stare at him. He paced back and forth, rubbing his fingers over his stubble. "Coin and Boggs have a falling-out and then Paylor is suddenly her right-hand? Not to mention how she played people in the mansion after his takedown. Talk about an underdog. And those parachutes at her speech actually did made me wish there were a few more guards in the districts to deter the crazies. Just brilliant."

"What are you talking about?" I said. "How does that have anything to do with her being Snow's... daughter?" The word was acid on my tongue.

"No, he's completely right," Katniss continued. "But that was later... Plutarch said she was born in Eight, Snow sent his pregnant concubine there as punishment. Paylor was raised hating him, she always knew her connection and never told anyone. When she was old enough, she gathered some support, and a rumored half-sibling... and went looking for Thirteen. Her plan was to get in with the most likely power that could overthrow Snow so she could replace him, to get revenge for abandoning her and her mother. It's all she ever wanted. The rebellion helped another power-hungry Snow into the Capitol."

I swallowed. It was impossible to fathom that anyone who grew up as oppressed as all of us were, regardless of parentage, would want the country to continue as it was. "I don't believe this!" Confusion, anger and betrayal dripped from the words. "Was the old regime such insufficient proof that no one could have such complete and utter control without eventual resistance?" I wondered.

"I guess it didn't matter," Rory interjected. "So long as she kept things quiet, under the table, put a stop to things like the Games, Plutarch guessed she could keep control for a long time that way. She's a golden-tongued psychopath. The pain of the people hardly registers, but she sure can talk her way into their loyalty." The young man was remarkably astute for his age, I thought.

Katniss looked over to Weaver. "DId you know any of this?"

He nodded. "We knew enough. Mr. Heavensbee was set to give us more detailed information when they captured him. It's unfortunate we weren't in time to recover him as well. But you've given us what we were missing, and we can move forward with dismantling the regime. Thank you for your intel, it helps to ensure that they didn't die in vain." he rose and swept out of the room.

"All business, that one," Haymitch muttered.

Rory's voice broke through. "They thought Gale told me things. They knew he told somebody, but they weren't sure who. They thought it might be me. That's why they came for us. Katniss was just a bonus to them." His eyes were rimmed in red. The boy hadn't really processed everything yet; it was hitting him in spurts. I knew the feeling. Haymitch had his hands on Rory's shoulders. "You shouldn't have been there," he told Katniss. It should have been just me."

Katniss squeezed his hand again. There was something about their connection, a mutual experience I wish I'd had going through what I did. I'd never wish my experiences on anyone, of course... but selfishly it would have been of some comfort. Something still troubled me, though. Like any of this didn't trouble me, but this wonder forced its way to the front. I licked my lips nervously. "If they didn't think she knew anything, why was she... interrogated... instead of you?" I asked him.

The flashback hit her without warning, and unlike me, she was raw and unprepared. It lasted only a few seconds, but I was sure it felt so much longer to her. I brought my lips to her ear, whispering sentiments and reassurance, apologizing for having reminded her. I should have known better. I knew the effects of flashbacks better than anyone. I could only be thankful that hers weren't chemically induced.

Rory sucked in a breath. "I was... they made me watch, so I'd talk."

"Oh..." Red flashed before my eyes. The bile rose up, threatening to spill over. I swallowed hard. Those things were done to me. I'd welcome them again, in this case. They should never, ever have been done to her.

"Peeta." Haymitch and Rory were staring at me, Rory with apprehensive confusion, Haymitch in warning. I hadn't realized, but Katniss had brought her hand to my chest.

"I'm fine. I'm sorry," I said to them all, but mostly to her.

"Can we have a few minutes?" Katniss asked them.

Haymitch glared at me for a moment, then took Rory and his mobile fluids back to his room with an excuse to talk to Weaver about the 'next step.' I knew if I had any involvement, I might be responsible for quite a bit of damage. I'd catch him later to discuss... things. Katniss patted the edge of the bed, inviting me closer. Of course I complied.

"Are you in pain?"

She shook her head. "I'm so sorry, Peeta. I shouldn't have left things the way they were. I blame the alcohol for the absurdity of my reaction but I should have listened in the morning. I know you didn't mean what you said. I know it was the venom talking." She gulped. "I love you. Please forgive me, and not because I look awful or because you were afraid for me. Forgive me because I'm impulsive and stupid and prone to the defaults of humanity sometimes. Please, Peeta. Please say you still want me."

She did look awful. I'd never seen her so broken. And I _was _scared for her, still terrified of what could happen if Paylor and her minions weren't stopped. It broke my heart. But in this moment where we existed together, something connected. We were vulnerable together. I hated the reason for her being this way, but it brought us together in a way nothing else could. "Of course I want you. Always have," I whispered, bringing my fingers to brush along her neck, the only place that wasn't bruised. "Please promise me you won't run away again," I begged her. "I know you were looking out for them. You're such an amazing friend to that family. But we're a team. I know you hate dwelling on things we can't change, but in this one rare instance I'm going to tell you that we _should _have gone together. You _could _have talked me into it." I offered her a gentle, forgiving smile. and she brought her bruised hand up to brush my cheek. I closed my eyes and leaned into her fingers.

"Okay."

I just stared at her for a while. Her eyes drifted closed, she'd startle a bit, perhaps to make sure I was still there. I reassured her each time. Dr. Raylin came by to check her vitals and adjusted her medicine. Haymitch passed by the doorway, waving me over. "Sweetheart, will you be okay by yourself for a while? I won't be long."

She nodded sleepily. "Promise you won't join any missions without talking to me first?"

I nodded. "Promise."

"Kiss me before you go," she asked.

"Will it hurt?"

She shook her head. "They gave me some good drugs."

I smiled slightly, leaning down to brush my lips against her puffy, bruised, cracked ones. She smelled of salt and medicine, but her lips responded to mine like they always had. I kissed her forehead too, for good measure.

"Be back as soon as I can."

She was asleep when I returned three hours later, curled onto her left side, clutching a pillow to her with more pillows tucked into her back. Dr. Raylin was sitting with her, reading. She stood when she saw me. "She woke an hour ago and asked for you," the doc told me. I thanked her for staying, and she nodded, looking back to Katniss with an air of fondness. "The staff and I are taking turns sitting with her. A little hero worship, you might say. She's handling the ordeal rather well."

I nodded. "If by 'well' you mean quietly, I tend to agree." I went to stand by the bedside and leaned down to softly kiss her hair. It smelled clean, and her skin had been coated with a shiny gel. Her bruises seemed fainter, if that were possible. I asked about them.

"Well, she's been lightly bathed, and the ointment absorbs to repair near-surface capillaries, with the fortunate side effect of reducing swelling." Yes, her face did look a little less puffy, too. "It doesn't penetrate enough to repair the deeper tissue injuries, but the IV meds are doing well. I'm more concerned about her mental state." The doc's voice was reserved on the last bit, and my stomach clenched reactively, as it often did regarding the woman I love.

"What do you mean?" I tested.

She flipped her notebook closed, clutching it with crossed arms over her chest. "Well, as I said she's taking the circumstance rather quietly. That sometimes happens after a captive or torture situation. The calm manner may be a front to deeper emotional trauma. She may feel more comfortable talking to you than to one of us; I understand her previous infirmary experiences were less than pleasant."

I shook my head. Not about helping her; I'd do that without hesitation. Anything she needed. But I was no expert, and I said so, perhaps a bit more forcefully than I intended.

"No, of course not," Dr. Raylin corrected. "But she trusts you. I have the impression there are very few she does trust, and understandably so."

I nodded at this. "Thank you."

The doc gave my arm a squeeze. "Come get any of us again if you need to go. We're more than happy to sit with her."

I wasn't planning to be yanked away again anytime soon. I dragged to the side facing her and settled in, leaning against the pillow clutched in her arms, trying not to disturb her ointment-slick, healing skin, which was noticeably turning a gray-green, a marked improvement from just several hours ago. I marveled at the change. Healing her psyche from the ordeal would be far less quick and easy.

She roused me from a blissfully gentle dream, I didn't know how much later. "Can we go home now?"

I blinked the sleep from my eyes, the corners of my mouth turning up a little. "As soon as they say you're okay, that's exactly where we'll go."

She sighed. "I'm okay now."

"I'm glad you feel better," I told her, tentatively brushing her hand. It was smooth and the color had improved drastically, now a little yellowish, like her face. She uncurled her fingers and let me hold hers in both of mine. I watched her face for a while.

She looked down at the light blue and white zigzag pinstripe of the pillowcase. "You think I'm holding back."

I sighed. "I don't think that. But I do know this, an experience like that is hard to let go of. It can also be hard to accept, or even acknowledge. But I'm here, and I _know_. You can talk to me. Even if I'm not qualified to help, I can listen." I gave my words a minute to settle. "You're so calm. It scares me a little."

She offered a small shrug. "Maybe... it hasn't really hit me. That it was real, you know? Or maybe I'm not all upset like everyone expects because I wasn't worried about me in there. I was worried about everybody else. What they did..." her eyes closed, she had to take several deep breaths to collect herself. "It was _nothing_... compared to how I'd feel if I knew they'd done that to Rory, or to Vick, or Posy... _sweet, little Posy_... or their mother," she breathed. "Or you." She looked at me pleadingly, profoundly. "I'd take it all over again if it kept any of you safe."

I was too stunned and heartbroken to register that I'd stopped breathing. She had to remind me to inhale. She called herself selfish, so often... but then she'd say something like that. I didn't need a reminder why I loved her more than anything, but I got one anyway.

"I'm not holding anything back right now. I promise you," she brought her hand to my cheek. Her voice sounded stronger. "Okay?"

I nodded. "Okay." And I did believe her. I just hoped if some latent feeling did surface, she wouldn't be afraid to come to me. And I had to vow to myself to be strong for her; in the past my reactions to her pain made her reserved and uncomfortable. I'd not allow that to be one of those times.

"So..." she broke me from my thoughts. "Tell me what happened."

~Katniss~

At worst, I felt trapped. By the sterile room, the bedclothes, the mountain of pillows strategically propping me off my bad side, the trio of worried medics I'd woken to, die-hard professionals who came across as something of a Mockingjay fan club. They weren't inappropriate about it at all; I just wasn't used to the attention, not since Cressida followed me around with her camera crew. I knew this was different and they were just trying to help, but I couldn't escape if I wanted to. And if this was the worst I was feeling, the meds were doing a good job, or the wake of what happened hadn't really hit me yet.

Peeta was the safe harbor when I woke again. He was the 'at best' part of this; his eyes and gentle hands kept me grounded. He was far less angry and agitated this time, and I was thankful. Selfishly I wanted, _needed_ him here, not off with this underground movement plotting some sort of revenge or whatever they were doing. Too many thoughts swirled around my medicated brain, mostly broken and passing, but others concrete and actively bothersome. He couldn't fathom how I was so calm, or so he implied. His own experience with recovering from trauma was now a commonality that we would always share and never escape from, but it didn't mean our experiences were similar at all. His had purpose, sick and twisted as it was. Mine was senseless and vindictive, a desperate attempt at extracting nonexistent information. I was surprisingly over it, for the moment. And honestly, I was tired of this this instinctual thing I played at; an avoidance rooted in a general lack of trust that often caused a rift between us. It was of my own making, and it hadn't solved anything. I was so done with that part of myself. I had to trust Peeta, wholeheartedly, whether my mind wanted to or not. My heart wanted him, and so I'd go against my own grain, until it strained and shifted into something more coexistent.

"So, tell me what happened."

He swallowed. He did that a lot when he was trying to assemble the information in a way I'd absorb it best. "I don't want to get you all upset, Katniss. Maybe I should tell you later."

"Are the Hawthornes all right?" I panicked.

"Yes, of course, they're all fine. In fact, Rory's going home in the morning, and there are two agents watching the house at all times. A real pleasant set of twins, from what Hazelle told me a half hour ago. She hopes you'll come back when you can as well. Rory agrees she shouldn't know what really happened. Might upset her too much."

I nodded. He was right, it was probably for the best. "Then, what could possibly upset me?" I asked. "Peeta, please." I wanted to ramble on about how I needed to know, that if it involved me or what happened I should be told, and that he shouldn't keep things from me, but my conscience and my tongue were tripping over each other.

You're not going to like it." He sighed. "Please don't overreact, I'm doing that enough for both of us."

"No promises."

He nodded. "The team that rescued you and Rory... they left something behind when they got you out of there. A bomb. They... blew up the training center."

This threw me, but only superficially. Not that I was at all attached to that place even before I was taken there to be tortured, but still. The fact that I don't handle change well probably contributed a bit to my reaction. The understanding of what it might ignite escaped me for the moment. "Don't tell me you'll miss that place." Where did that come from? Sarcasm wasn't really my thing. "So they took out an icon of the old leadership and probably a few bad guys with it. So what?"

"That's just it. The training center still was just that... for the New Republic Guard. An estimated eighty-three percent of Paylor's soldiers were eliminated in the attack, not to mention a handful of civilians.

Now, I was stunned. It was happening, all over again. "How many?"

"Eighty-three percent."

"How many _people?_"

A pause. "Over fifteen hundred."

I swallowed down acid that burned the back of my tongue. "How... how could they? Why? Without telling us? How is _that _going to expose the truth? What have they started?" The meds weren't suppressing me anymore. I was positively livid.

"That was the first thing I asked," he explained. "Don't get me wrong, I'm not exactly defending them. But according to their sources on the inside, the troops were set to deploy to the districts this morning. If the decision hadn't been made quickly, there may have been no stopping them. Love, the resistance lost two of their own informants in the explosion. This isn't being taken lightly, I assure you."

"But fifteen hundred _people_. People who lived in fear of reapings, like we all did. People who volunteered to rebuild. People from the rebellion. _People_, Peeta."

"What do you think we did with the Peacekeepers from before, Katniss? They were people as well." His words stung. I hadn't really known that, hadn't wanted to know, but he was right, as usual. He continued. "_These _people don't mess around, not when it comes to securing freedom. Several of Weaver's committee are from Thirteen, and fortunately, it looks like they know what they're doing. I hate that they did it this way, but the resistance has been working on this for months and ran out of time. What's awful about all this is that _if _they could have found a way to discredit Paylor, the Guard would likely have disbanded peacefully, by default, but her inner circle is so tight and her performance so perfected, it would have been too difficult to point enough wrong-doing in her direction to sway the public opinion, especially while everything is still so raw."

"You make the Guard sound like a bunch of drones. They weren't, some of them were from back home. Why would they follow orders that would make them look just like Peacekeepers?"

"Haymitch actually had that thought through before I did. I guess it looks different from the other side, from a position of authority as opposed to submitting to it. The Guard were trained first in organization; under the premise of promoting order and safety, they had the authority to ration supplies and draft civilians for labor, and that meant enforcing order, by whatever means necessary. Not much different from what we grew up with."

My mind strung questions like wet laundry on a clothesline, some were heavy and dropped off while others hung steadfastly, waving as if to keep my attention. "Speaking of the public, what are they saying?"

"They're scared. Confused. Angry. To them, the bombing looks like a terrorist act by leftovers from Snow's administration, trying to shake things up. Weaver's organizing damage control. Pollux is here, he's been asked to film an appropriate message to push over the airwaves. They've... they want me to be the face of the resistance."

That did it. I wasn't sure why it hit me the way it did; Peeta excelled at getting people to listen, maybe it was just the last lump of coal that broke the cart. I shifted uncomfortably, trying to roll against the barricade of pillows and onto my other side. I couldn't look at him, let him see the hurt in my eyes or he might think he caused it. The stabbing pain in my ribs returned and I winced, my tender skin still throbbing, however not as badly as before. It still hurt, but not enough to take my mind off this.

"Katniss," his hand lightly found my shoulder. "Please talk to me. Tell me how you feel about this; I don't want to do it... I think you should. The public likes you, they're familiar with you. Many of them trust you. And this might be the only way to make sure that she doesn't get away with hurting anyone else."

I sighed. This was just too much. My head hurt again, another pain to add to the list of discomfort I felt, and that overwhelmed me too. "Peeta," I said softly, "I just need to think. This is... a lot. I don't know how I feel about it. I need some time." I heard him draw breath, and felt his hand stroke its way down my arm to my hand. I caught it in my fingers and gave an apologetic squeeze.

"Okay." I heard him give in with a sigh. "Do you want me to go?"

"Of course not," I said, still facing away. "Just don't want to talk anymore." I felt him kiss my hair, and the chair off to the side squished as he settled himself there. A while later I heard him snoring lightly. At least one of us would rest tonight. I didn't know which was worse; that the resistance was willing and even capable of pulling off such a monstrous atrocity for the greater good, or superficially, that I did not want to be on camera again, part of propaganda, accomplice to the manipulation of the people. It was stupid that I worried over the latter, but it proves how selfish I can be.

And how little I deserved him.

~Peeta~

Of course she didn't take it well. She was in pain, her perception contorted from the drugs, and I had to lay all that on her, regardless that she would have dragged it out of me. I should have waited until she felt better, more herself. At any rate it was done. I shouldn't have suggested she take the position I was offered... that was too much. I was being selfish. Even though I know she could do a much better job, and that I meant what I said about the people believing and following her, I shouldn't have put that burden on her. Some supportive boyfriend I am.

I knew I was going to fall asleep in that chair, I rather welcomed the rest, but I wanted to be awake in case she needed something. Wishful thinking... of course she wouldn't want to talk to me for a while. Haymitch shook me awake later, handing me a cup of bitter coffee and indicating for me to follow him. I sipped the hot liquid, willing the heat to migrate to my stiff neck before anywhere else, and stole a long look at Katniss, fast asleep, still facing away. I hoped I'd be back before she woke again.

"So... whaddya think?" Haymitch tested.

"About what?" I mumbled. "The plan or my part in it?"

"Both I guess."

I took a long swig of the coffee, my expression fleetingly souring at the taste. "I think it sucks."

"Right on." We stood in silence for a moment, at the meeting room window overlooking the command center.

"Anything new?"

Haymitch shrugged. "Rory just left, said to tell you and Katniss to come when you can. Doc Aurelius is gonna pay him a visit soon; he swears Hazelle won't be told a thing, at least about what _he _went through."

"How you holding up?"

"I want a drink."

I nodded. "Could use one myself." We shared another long silence. I gulped down the dark, grainy dregs at the bottom of my cup and went to the machine to pour myself another. "What's the word on the outside?"

Haymitch shook his head. "Can't be sure. The closest informant went silent right after you left, haven't heard from her since. Weaver wants you to record a statement in the next hour. Damage control and all that. The written statement claiming responsibility for the training center isn't having quite the effect we were hoping for. Paylor and the other candidates are up in arms over the bombing, you shoulda seen the footage. If only the others could see the bitch for what she is, they'd be applauding the rubble downtown instead of yelling over it."

"I told Katniss she should do it, not me," I blurted out.

"You... what?"

"I know. I... I didn't mean to put that on her; it's just that some of the committee is right; she's got the public trust already. Everybody just remembers me being Snow's pawn..."

"No, they remember you as the honest kid who made them see Snow for what he really was," his eyes pierced through me. "You've got as much respect as that girl does, and a heckofa smarter tongue at that. You'll do fine. You takin your meds?"

"Yeah."

"Then go meet Pollux down the hall. I'll go sit with your girl for a while. Maybe get a few winks while I'm at it." He stumbled for the door. I couldn't remember the last time the old man slept.

"Haymitch... tell her I'm sorry."

He looked puzzled, then decided not to ask. "You got it."

I gulped down the last of the coffee. It wasn't quite scorching, but a line of sweat broke out across my brow. That could have been nerves. I hadn't seen Pollux since the mission, since his brother was killed. I figured since he was here, he probably knew they wanted to film me, so he must not hate me that much. It might have been partially my fault his brother was dead. I wasn't sure anymore. _Oh well, I should get this over with_, I thought, trudging out the door. The coffee was doing nothing to wake me, but it made me nervous as ever.

"Pee-tah!" Ropy arms picked me up and swung me around. I stumbled when they set me down. "Good see-you, Pee-tah!" Bright blue eyes and reddish hair couldn't detract from the wide grin on the Avox's face, but wait... Avoxes can't talk. Could they?

"You... you can talk now?"

Pollux laughed. "We are same now, you and I," he said, extending his... tongue? Yes, it was blue and artificial, but it flexed like a tongue might. "Hard say all words, but good now." He seemed very proud. I couldn't begin to imagine the freedom he must feel. I returned his smile and lifted my pants leg, showing him the newer, more-realistic prosthetic. Pollux laughed again and clapped. "Come, we work now."

I read a script they prepared as a stylist attempted to improve my appearance, making me change into this shirt and those pants and brushing my hair this way and that. It was hard to be primped while having a friendly argument over the content and articulation of my lines, especially because Pollux's speech tended to quicken when he disagreed, and his already fractured words tumbled together. I had to be patient. In the end, what we agreed on sounded enough like me to be heartily believable, while relaying the intended message. Weaver came in during the final taping.

"_My fellow Citizens, my name is Peeta Mellark. Many of you know me as a victor of the Hunger Games, and a member of the rebellion that brought down the worst dictator of our nation's history. It is my resolute duty to make you aware of a rising threat to our freedom. President Paylor, a person who I had held in high esteem, has been revealed as the late President Snow's daughter, and a traitor to our people. Many have been silenced in uncovering the details of her agenda. The charges against her include reinstatement of the Peacekeepers, cruel interrogation against persons of interest, and the murder of Captain Gale Hawthorne, Secretary Plutarch Heavensbee, Victor Beetee Silane, Victor Johanna Mason, Victor Enobaria Schistt, and the attempted murder of Victor Katniss Everdeen. If our President wishes to dispute these charges, we call upon her to submit to a trial by jury of the people. If not, I call upon you, my fellow citizens of Panem, to demand the President's immediate and unconditional surrender. Ms. Paylor, the new resistance awaits your response_."

Weaver gave the thumbs-up, and the camera cut. "That'll do nicely, Mr. Mellark. Thank you for your assistance." He nodded to Pollux and walked out; Pollux set down the camera and clapped me on the shoulder. "Good work, Pee-tah. Cas-tor wo- would be proud."

I offered the big man a brave half smile. "I only hope it has the intended effect."

He nodded. "You come see me la-ter?"

"Of course, my friend."

He grinned widely again. "Say hi Ka-niss for me."

She was awake when I returned. Still facing away, but she had her hands over her ears and Haymitch snored obnoxiously in the only decent chair, one foot propped haphazardly on a metal stool. I went around the bed and her eyes met mine immediately. She looked so much better, and rather annoyed. "Peeta, please get me out of here," she whispered.

One of the nurses brought some drawstring pants and a thermal shirt to replace the thin, tentlike snap-on gown and dug up slip-on shoes, ran a brush through her hair and tied it back in a low knot. The tape over her ribs gave Katniss limited range of motion, but though she winced, she didn't complain. She got unsteadily to her feet and took my offered hand for support. We got a short lecture on not straying too far or doing too much and were released.

"How do you feel? The truth, now." I kept one hand on the small of her back, unable to disconnect from her.

She sighed. "Better. Still hurts, but I don't want to be cooped up anymore. I know I can't do much like this, but I want to do _something_." She was silent for a minute, but we shuffled forward, with no destination in mind. "I promise I'll tell you if it's too much or if I need help, okay?"

I smiled. "Thank you. For trusting me." Now it was my turn to be silent. It took a few minutes just to go thirty feet, and then I couldn't help it anymore, I had to tell her. About earlier. "I uh... I already helped to 'do something', actually." I told her about the propo. "I'm so, so sorry that I asked you to do that in my place," I continued. "It was wrong of me. You've been through enough. I know you didn't want to be the Mockingjay the first time around, and I was so insensitive to ask that of you. I was only thinking of the situation we're all in, and it went against my nature to put that responsibility on you... I should have thought of you first. I should always put you first. I'm sorry."

"Peeta..."

"Please, Katniss... just accept my apology. The last thing I want for us is an argument. Please?" My eyes radiated sincerity.

She nodded thoughtfully. "Okay. So... how did it go?"

I sighed, the corners of my mouth turning up in relief. "I can show you, want to see?"

Pollux was still in the media room when we made it to the doorway. "Hey Pollux, look who's up and about."

The big man's eyes lit up, he rose from his computer and lumbered over to us. I was instantly afraid he might pick her up like he did me, but he came to a stop and offered his hand. I guessed he'd been told something of her condition, or maybe he sensed her current fragility; her bruises were almost completely faded. He lightly squeezed her fingers. "So good t-to see you are safe, Ka-niss," he enunciated.

Katniss gave a short laugh of surprise, a sound I thought I'd not hear again for a long time. "That's fantastic, Pollux," she congratulated him as he showed her his blue tongue. I had to laugh with them, if anything to relish whatever joy could be found in this sterile place and gloomy, uncertain circumstance.

"Ed-it-ing almos- fin-ished, come see," he waved us to follow and offered Katniss his chair. It was just weird to see myself on the screen, so I watched Katniss as she viewed the reworked propo. Her face was studious. She asked to see it again, and then once more. She shook her head at the end.

"What's wrong with it?" I asked.

"Absolutely nothing," she said. "I have to be honest, I was looking for something to be wrong with it; but I can't come up with anything better to say or how to say it. I didn't like hearing my name on the list of victims, but that's just a selfish observation... it might be just what gets the people going, and answers why you'd be on camera in my place." She turned to Pollux. "When does it air?"

"Soon as it's done," he articulated almost evenly.

Katniss' stomach took the opportunity to grumble audibly, and Pollux laughed. His spirit was refreshing; I wish I knew how he maintained such a cheerful attitude, especially in light of everything he'd lost. "Hey buddy, I need to feed Katniss, but you're welcome to join us when you're done," I invited, helping Katniss to her feet again.

"I wou-woul-d like very mu-ch," he told us.

Lunch in the mess hall was some sort of vegetable protein paste on flatbread. At least the meal came with some decent fruit, oranges were in season and they kept well, so they'd been offered liberally at mealtimes since we'd arrived. Pollux wasn't far behind, and he regaled us with some well-practiced tongue twisters. His doc made them part of his therapy, he said. Katniss was quiet, chewing slowly and deliberately. She was tired, I could tell... I'd take her back to her room when she was finished so she could get some rest. I'd also boot Haymitch's snoring self from the visitors' chair and send him to find a more soundproofed place to pass out.

My lighthearted plan crumbled when Haymitch burst into the mess hall, almost knocking a young technician's tray from her hands. "I need to see you two. Now."

"Sorry Pollux, another time," I apologized, and he waved us off. I gingerly gathered Katniss into my arms; she was looking more and more tired by the minute, and I doubted Haymitch wanted to wait for me to help her shuffle in her slip-ons. He held the door of an empty room across the hall, a records storage room judging from the stacked boxes of papers and files, and the musty smell. His eyes were wide and excited.

"Good news is, the propo worked. Within minutes, all districts were calling for investigations into the charges. Weaver's gamble paid off." He sucked in a breath. "But there's bad news."

Katniss' weak body stiffened in my arms. "What bad news?" I demanded, my voice low.

"It looks like our favorite President has given us the slip. It's gonna be hard to conduct a trial without a warm body to hold accountable."


	14. Chapter 13

_**AN: I apologize for the time it took to continue this story. Real life does that sometimes. Enjoy.**_

* * *

**Chapter 13**

~Katniss~

I picked up a berry from the ground; remembering our 'come find me' game. The next few were scattered up the hill, almost lost among the ground cover, but my sharp eyes are trained to look for the subtle things. His back disappeared in the distance when my eyes came level with the top of the incline, and I took off after him.

"Gale!" I shouted, my vision fading to sterile gray walls, my side protesting the sudden movement. I brought my hand over the thickly-taped patch over my ribs. They throbbed painfully, but not sharply as before.

"Hey," a soothing voice came to me, arms guided my shoulders back onto a nest of pillows. Peeta's ever-concerned blue eyes drew mine in. "I'm here. It was just a dream." His hands brushed over my forehead and brought me fully into the present.

"What did I miss?" I breathed. He'd brought me back to bed after Haymitch's fill-in; I was nearly passed out in his arms as it was. I considered the possibility of my dreams taking me back to the cellar of the training center, or perhaps to follow the traitor to her hiding place. Gale didn't even enter my mind, but he was bold enough to enter my dreams. I'd given up trying to figure out what he wanted me to do with that.

"Not much," he soothed me. "They're still looking for her; Weaver sent some agents to the palace and a few teams are out looking, discreetly. It's a sure bet that if she shows her face anywhere she'll be called out, so she's keeping a low profile. They think she has some hiding places back in Eight, so they're looking heavily there. At any rate, running off makes her look more than guilty." His eyes scanned my face. "How are you feeling?"

"Confused, I guess. Not sure why. I hate being useless." I deserved bonus points for honesty. That was the most genuine and sincere thing I could have said, and I didn't think it through or edit, I just let it out.

"I know, love." He gave me a moment, or maybe he wanted to say something and was afraid of how to tell me. He settled on the latter. "Um, your mom was frantically trying to get ahold of you. She saw the propo and freaked out a little bit. She called Hazelle and the got the twins to transfer it down here."

"Ohhh..." my face crinkled with regret. I didn't like my mother very much, but she didn't deserve to hear my almost-end broadcast for the country to hear. "I didn't even think about her. I'm a terrible daughter."

"No you aren't. Not ever. I spoke with her myself. She wanted me to pass on that she's glad you're all right. She hopes you'll connect with her once things settle down. Don't worry, I didn't give her any room to think you'd get back to her immediately. Just whenever you're ready, okay?"

"Thank you, Peeta." I squeezed his hand lightly.

"So... we're going home tomorrow," he told me.

"What?" I didn't know if my face lit up, but something inside me did; this was the best thing I'd heard since I'd left home.

"We'll have a few agents to escort us and everything. And Haymitch, of course. He's eager to get home to his geese." Peeta chuckled at himself.

"Yeah, I'm sure that's it exactly." Then something dawned on me. "Do we... I mean, I don't have to come back, for the trial, do I?" I worried. "That is, assuming they find her before the citizens do. They might do her in before the agents can bring her back. I don't really want to come back here, Peeta." I was really getting the hang of this blatant honesty thing. Maybe it's just that was Peeta, not Dr. Aurelius, who has some critique of everything I'm thinking. Peeta takes me as I am. I should have trusted him from the start.

"I know you don't. Believe me. I know exactly how you feel." He did, he really did know. "We'll try to work it out so it doesn't come to that. But I promise you, If it's necessary to come back, I'll be by your side no matter what. We're in this together."

I sighed. "We make a good team." This brought out his rare, crooked grin, the one that only came out when he was sure that I was his, and no one else's.

"Yeah, we do," he agreed. "So tell me about this dream of yours..."

The underground train dropped the six of us at a freight elevator. It reminded me of the one used in Twelve to send workers into the mines. I shuddered, willing myself to remember that we were going up, not down. And this one was rather roomy and devoid of coal dust, so that helped negate the long-imprinted mental imagery. The doors opened into a dark warehouse; we had one of those in Twelve also, but smaller, and it also carried a load of coal dust, though its purpose was for storing the grain for tesserae. It rarely stored anything though, and some of the Seam kids often went there to play, only to be chased out eventually by one of Cray's deputies. The path of my thoughts helped me break from the daze. Peeta had carefully gathered me in his arms again for the walk to the train station, and I let him without question. I was in no shape for the speed at which they walked. In the low light of late evening and with our dark clothing, we went unrecognized. The train was a familiar and strangely comforting sight.

Since Paylor had largely been targeting Victors, Weaver's committee had decided it would be best if we each had an agent assigned to us, for protection, until she was found and brought to justice. We'd reluctantly agreed. It gave Peeta peace of mind, and so I didn't fight it. Haymitch was a mother hen that evening, coming to check on us, bringing a variety of food from the private dining car and making sure I was brought extra pillows. He and Peeta worried over me; and for once, I welcomed it. Later, I wondered if maybe my lack of resistance to their ministrations added to their worry, but I brushed it off. Peeta got a certain satisfaction and enjoyment from caring for me, and I was going to allow him that. As for Haymitch, he'd have his geese and his alcohol soon enough, and would forget to worry about me entirely, so I wasn't as concerned about what he thought of my sudden change in attitude.

It was Peeta's turn to have a nightmare that night. He woke with a shout, sitting bolt upright and panting, the sheets crushed in his fists. I reached out to touch his arm and he startled for a second, calming down almost instantly with a shuddered sigh. He flopped unceremoniously back onto his pillow and faced me. "I'm sorry," he said, over and over.

"No need to be," I stroked his cheek with my fingers, reassuringly. His eyes closed and he leaned into my touch. "Talk to me, Peeta. Tell me what happened."

His eyes opened, they were dark as they studied my face. I gently reminded him not to edit for my benefit, and he nodded. "I was remembering the day you came home with your hair cut off... it was strange. The whole day played in reverse, and then went forward again. I saw everything, every mistake right before I made it, like they were taunting me. It was awful." His hand came up to cover mine, still resting on his face. He turned into my palm and planted a kiss there. "I'm so glad you're here with me."

I gave him a sleepy smile. "I remember something about that day too." He waited for me to continue. "That list you left me that morning... it wasn't until after I left for Two that I remembered it was still in my pants pocket. It had been washed but it was still intact, if a little crispier than before. I was on the train when I saw it... the note you wrote on the back. Do you remember what you wrote?"

He nodded solemnly. "I asked if it was real if... we were married." He cleared his throat. "The Doc didn't know for sure and Haymitch said I should talk to you, he wasn't saying anything. I mean, I kinda recall the interview where I said it, but I've been so unsure and it seemed so private and so trivial compared to all the other things, that I didn't make it important enough to really talk about." He paused. "So... are we?"

My heart chose at that moment to flood with such deep affection for the boy with the bread, I had to restrain myself from throwing my arms around him and kissing him deeply. Also because such careless movement was bound to ache terribly. I chose my words honestly. "We could be, if you still want to be."

The crooked grin broke across his face. Twice in as many days, I brought this pure joy to his face; and it radiated back to my heart. He was as much mine as I was his, in that moment and forward. "More than anything," he told me.

~Peeta~

I wish my family was here to see how happy I was, how happy she'd made me. They of course knew all the time, what she meant to me. My brothers teased me relentlessly, my father constantly encouraged me to tell her how I felt. But my mother had been right about me, I was too soft at the time, too wimpy to tell her. I hadn't deserved her then. I did now.

I carried her most of the way home from the train station; it was late evening again, and we slipped quietly through the darkness. Katniss insisted that I put her down when we got to the end of our street, and so we walked hand in hand the rest of the way, bidding Haymitch and one of the agents a good night as we stepped up onto our porch. One of our protectors stayed with us while the other briefly swept the house for intruders, checking for eavesdropping devices with a small handheld scanner along the way. When he deemed our house was clear and all doors and windows had been secured, they bid us good night and retreated to the empty house next door. My old house.

"I think I'll go up and get into the bath," Katniss decided.

"Need help on the stairs?" I offered, and she shook her head.

"I'll manage. Thanks though, Peeta." Her hand pressed briefly over my breastbone and headed for the staircase.

"I'll bring up some tea, all right?"

She turned back and smiled. "That would be great."

I busied myself boiling water and setting out mugs, digging up some tea leaves from a canister and shaking them into a strainer. I added honey for a touch of sweetness. I tried to ignore the foreignness of our own kitchen. It felt like I'd been gone so much longer than two weeks, but it was long enough to leave a slight layer of dust on the counter. I decided to remedy that in the morning.

Balancing a tray with two steaming mugs in one hand, I knocked lightly on the bathroom door. "Would you like your tea in there, or in the bedroom?"

"In here," she called back.

I opened the door slowly, keeping my eyes respectfully lowered to the brownstone floor tiles. She'd turned the lights on a low setting, but just high enough that I could peripherally make out her form reclining against the back of the tub. I carefully passed one of the mugs in her direction, averting my eyes.

"It's okay, Peeta," she said, as I felt the mug leave my hand. "I don't mind if you see me. Besides, the bubbles are covering most of me."

Shyly, the corners of my mouth turned up, and I raised my lashes, trying hard not to be bashful. Her hair was wet, curling only slightly at the ends where it touched her shoulders. Her shoulders... bare and lightly freckled, glistening from the steaming bathwater. My eyes traveled to her neck, the dip between her collarbones, and up to her eyes. Her scars had largely been smoothed by the Capitol medicines; only tiny lines remained of the more prominent ones. She was watching me, watching me watch her. Everywhere south was masked by a thick foam of creamy bubbles, except her hands which held the tea I'd handed her. "I'm sorry," I chuckled, looking away, feeling the heat rise in my cheeks. My heart thumped hard in my chest.

"Peeta, if you want to be my husband, you can't be afraid to look at me," she teased.

"I'm not afraid," I glanced her way again, my breaths coming faster. "Just... overwhelmed." I scraped my bottom lip against my teeth. "You're so heartbreakingly beautiful."

Now it was her turn to blush, hardly distinct through her olive skin, but I noticed. I noticed everything about her. Always had. I hoped that I always would. I sat down on the floor next to her, taking a sip from my mug and reaching forward to set it at the edge of the sink.

"So... about getting married," I began, "how would you feel about waiting a little bit, just till things calm down and you're all better?" I gulped. "I don't want you to feel rushed. And we don't _have _to do a wedding or anything big, unless you wanted to... we could just register at the Justice Center and then come home and have a toasting. Or anything you want, however you want." My tongue was starting to trip over itself, and I was glad she stopped me there.

"Peeta, I just want to be with you." Her voice was so resolute, I was surprised at the depth of feeling emanating from her eyes. "I'm okay with waiting if it's what you want, but things will never calm down, there will always be something to deal with. I just want something to be clear between us, because there's no going back if we do this."

I braced myself, knowing what she was about to say. "You... don't want children."

She nodded slowly. "I feel like I owe you an explanation," she said softly. "The thought scares me. It's something I'll probably never get over. I might have... reconsidered... if this whole thing hadn't just happened, but it did, and it proves that no matter how safe we think we are or how much better things can get, there will always be people out there that can ruin it all over again. If no one had caught on this time, we might be back to the way things were in Snow's time right now. Maybe minus the Games, but..." she sighed. "I can't with good conscience bring children into such an uncertain place. No matter how much I'd love to give you them. I just can't, Peeta."

I was nodding, swallowing back the devastation, but knowing this was an inevitability, one of the many things I was willing to give up just to keep her. I blinked back my sorrowful expression, bringing my arm to rest on the rim of the tub, and she brought her hand to grasp my fingers. "I understand," I offered, barely succeeding at willing my voice not to break. "It's okay, Katniss. I knew that was part of the deal, and no matter what, I still want you more than anything else, and it's enough. If you'll still have me."

She smiled sadly, knowing what having her was costing me, but resigning to my decision. "Of course I will. And I promise to try to be the best wife and friend to you that I know how to be. I might mess up sometimes, but I won't ever give up. I'll do everything I can to make you happy. It's the very least you deserve."

"It's more than I deserve," I whispered, leaning toward her, resting my head against the warm, curved porcelain, and felt her lean her head against mine. "You're everything I've ever wanted. Just tell me when you're ready, all right?"

"Okay."

We enjoyed each other a while longer, murmuring words of care and affection until her bathwater ran cool and I coaxed her out, wrapping her in an oversize towel and holding her in my arms. She left me to shower a few minutes later and waited for me to join her in the bedroom. How my heart ached for her when I came in and saw her curled up on her side in only her underwear; I donned a pair of my own and climbed into the bed, and she instantly pressed herself against me, skin on skin for the first time. I'd dreamed of this moment for so long, and now that it had come, it was more than I'd ever imagined. I pressed my lips to her forehead, breathing in the clean hair and the scent of her soap. One arm curled around her shoulders and, pulling her to me, I let the other hand carefully explore her back and then down her side, being careful of her still-tender ribs, ending at the curve of her hip that peeked out of the small bit of fabric that I wouldn't dare breach without her permission. Her fingers traced patterns across my chest, moving down to the plane of my stomach, lingering over my belly button. Strangely, this casual, new exploration did not overwhelm us, but felt natural, and after a few long moments of getting to know one another, our hands stilled and we drifted off to sleep.

~Katniss~

Weeks passed, I didn't count how many. Peeta returned to the bakery during the day, and after a while of being cooped up in the house, I returned to hunting. My agent, a dark-skinned fellow called Lem, tailed me stealthily at a comfortable distance wherever I went; he was quiet and didn't interfere, but his presence actually did make me feel a bit more secure. Sae took most of my game every day and fed it to the workers tending Twelve's first harvest. Peeta would usually show up with a donation of excess bread and then we'd walk home together, but on one day not in particular, I detoured to the post destribution office to pick up a package I'd been notified was on its way. A young, gray-eyed Seam girl, helping her mother with the post that afternoon, handed me an envelope through the pickup window, her expression betraying awe and reverence. I never did get used to how people looked at me, and I felt my ears turn red as I thanked her and marched away, tearing at the corner of the thick paper.

_Miss Everdeen,_

_I've never been very good with pleasantries, so I'll get straight to the point. Enclosed is a letter that was originally intended for you, in the event of the late Mr. Hawthorne's passing. It is written in his own hand, as confirmed by a graphologist under my employ. I apologize for intercepting this correspondence, but it would have been dangerous for us all if it had fallen into the wrong hands before the present. I assure you that only my eyes have seen the entirety of this letter, and that its contents will never be made public._

_Sincerely,_

_R. Weaver_

My heart thudded. Shaking fingers shoved the cover letter back inside and pulled out a smaller, torn envelope. My name was written on the front... yes, it was Gale's messy, incited script.

_Katniss. I'm so sorry._

_That day, you lost the most important person in your life, because of something I did. I can never set it right. I didn't give the order, nor did I know the circumstance, but it was my plan and my creation that took her life. No amount of my sorrow will ever console you, this is why I have not tried. I no longer deserve you in my life, and it's an insufficient punishment for the worst deed I'll ever do. All I can do now is to make sure her loss will be remembered, and that it won't have been in vain. I asked Rory to relay these things to you, and if he hasn't already, please tell him he's off the hook. He'll know what that means._

_Now, there are some things that are vital for you to know, and if you're reading this, it means I'll never be able to tell you myself. There are things progressing in the Capitol that have a lot of us worried. We've come to the realization that Paylor's intentions may not be entirely honorable. There's little proof as yet, but you can't trust her. I've had a target on my back for some time now, over the things I've discovered. Someone named Weaver may be contacting you shortly with questions, and you may not like his manner, but you can trust him. He'll know what to do and can keep you safe. Please be careful, you have no idea how much you mean to me._

_I have no right to ask anything of you, but I'm going to anyway. Love, Katniss. Love fiercely, as I know you can, and let your life have meaning. Fight when it matters, and forgive when it counts. Let that boy take care of you; you deserve him. You were my dearest friend, and I miss you terribly. Be happy, Catnip._

_-Gale_

The letter crumpled in my fingers. I hadn't realized I'd stopped right in the middle of the street.

"Miss, we should move along," Lem suggested quietly from over my shoulder.

I blew out a breath and sucked in another. I hadn't realized I'd been holding it. My mind swam with Gale's words, my gut twisting in a cloying sweetness that had me reeling, but I wasn't sad. There was a lump in my throat, but I rather than being in despair for the ones I'd lost, I was quickly brimming over with a determination to embrace everything I still had. I burst into a dead run, weaving past a scattering of people toward the Merchant's Quarter. The bakery was still lit in the late afternoon, and though my lungs were in desperate want for rest and air, the need to reach my goal was greater. I threw myself through the front door, the bells tied to the handle ringing shrilly from the force of my entrance. Peeta looked up from behind the counter, his face went straight to concern from whatever it had been before I barged in, holding out a paper bag to a customer.

I struggled to catch my breath. "Can I borrow you for a little bit?"

Peeta licked his lips nervously, but sprang into action. "Jin, come up front!" He called toward the storage room, and his middle-aged assistant came out carrying a bowl of half-kneaded dough. "I'm going out for a while!" He pulled his apron over his head, offering a swift apology to the customer, and was in front of me within seconds, his own agent, Sedge, close behind. I grabbed his hand and pulled him along with me, still breathless. I dashed past Lem, Peeta tripping at my side and a little behind.

"Where are we going?" he ventured to ask.

"The Justice Center."

"Oh no... what did Haymitch do?" he assumed.

"Nothing," I felt a smile tease the corners of my mouth. Peeta didn't ask anything more until we were on the concrete steps, when the tension on our joined hands pulled me back to face him.

"Katniss, what is this?" he reached down and pulled the envelope out of my other hand. I'd forgotten I was carrying it. Peeta just held it up, he made no move to open it. "Please, tell me what's going on. Is this why we're here?"

"Um... not really, it just made me realize some things." It was as vague an explanation as there ever was, but it didn't matter. My heart was swelling with everything I felt for him, and that's all that mattered in this moment.

"Like...?" he prodded.

I gulped. "Like, I want to get married. Now. Today."

Peeta choked on his own breath. He dropped the envelope and both hands came to cup my face. He looked into my eyes, trying, I think, to see if I was crazy. Which I sort of was, but then, so was he. "You're not kidding, are you?"

I shook my head, a smile creeping its way across my lips. Lips that were instantly crushed by his own, his breath blowing hard and sweet on my cheek in his excitement. He broke away for a second to ask "Are you sure?" and stole another kiss as I'd barely begun to nod. Then it was his turn to pull me up the steps.

The formality of marriage was a surreal blur. We signed papers with our names stamped onto them, submitted a spot of blood for the records, and recited a few outdated declarations of household sharing and other nonsense that would likely be amended in the years to come, but as it was the requirement, we dutifully complied. Our fingers remained entwined from the beginning. "So, that's it?" I asked the official.

"That's it, Mrs. Mellark," he offered me an acknowledging smile, handed Peeta a folded, wax-sealed copy of our marriage certificate, and excused himself. My eyes glazed over. Had this really just happened?

Peeta swept me into a laughing hug, his arms drawing me tightly into him. When he pulled back, his blue eyes were dancing. "I love you so, so much." It was all he could say before I rocked forward on my tiptoes and kissed him. This would be our life from now on. I would fill it with as much love as I had within me, and then maybe, I'd begin to deserve him. It was the only way to start again after all that had happened to us. When I came up for air, Peeta was still mesmerized. I smiled at the remembrance of how long he'd been waiting for this, for me. I cupped his face, dusting a bit of remnant flour from his jawline. "I need to start taking better care of you," I said.

He chuckled at this. "You already take such good care of me." He planted a triumphant kiss on my palm and entwined his fingers in mine again. "Shall we?"

I nodded, letting him lead us out into the hall. The attendant who'd directed us on the way in stood as though we were somehow much more worthy of notice than when we'd entered, and when he pulled the double doors open for us, I learned why. A roar of cheers and applause rang out from the square. A sea of smiling faces and waving hands, all turned out in support. I was floored. I looked to Peeta, and we exchanged matching expressions of bewilderment. I wondered if we were thinking the same things... _Is this going to trigger a flashback? What do I do if it does?_ And least importantly, _How did everyone know?_ But his eyes were clear and bright, and his crooked grin so lovely and meant only for me, that I did something I'd never thought I'd do in my life, let alone twice in less than an hour; I told my brain to shut up and let my heart take over, and pulled my husband to me in a world-shattering kiss. My _husband_... yes, this is what he would forever be. My love, my life. Gale's words had given me the push I needed to finally let go, to make me realize I could be with Peeta without fear of betraying my past. When we broke apart finally, Peeta raised our joined hands between us. I recognized so many faces, etched in varying spirits of congratulatory mirth, from the post administrator's daughter to the leagues of tiredly elated harvest workers, from Thom and his building crew to our agents... who were trying to keep their approval reserved... from Sae and her granddaughter, to Haymitch... pushing his way through the crowd to stand before us.

"About time, Sweetheart," he said, and tucked a golden dandelion into my hair. Traditionally, a girl's father is supposed to crown her with a wreath of flowers when he gives his daughter's hand to her new husband, but on short notice, this seemed all he could handle. I had no idea he felt so strongly for taking on this role, I didn't even know how the entire town found out. It hadn't been more than twenty minutes since we'd arrived, and it takes about that long to walk across town, so I supposed it was possible. Haymitch swept me into a bear hug before I could do anything to stop him, and in doing so, actually did remind me of being wrapped in my father's arms, and it brought me more comfort than I could have prepared for. Peeta's sweet, joyful laughter rang out behind me, and Haymitch released me, kissing both of my cheeks. He turns to shake Peeta's hand firmly, "Just go along with it, Sae's making me do this," he mutters to us, then turning and raising his arms to quiet the crowd.

"Well if I'd found out earlier that Twelve's favorite Victors were gonna pull something like this, I coulda had something better to say," he looked back to shoot us a glance of affectionate irritation. "In any case, I'd say it's worth a party. I propose we mark the end of the harvest in three weeks with a shindig in their honor. Twelve is due for some celebratin' if you ask me." Cheers broke out again, and Haymitch, along with our three protectors, ushered us down the steps and out of the square. "Sae didn't think you'd want to spend the rest of the day explaining to every last person why you tried to keep this all secretive-like. And," he leaned toward me as we fast-walked toward the Village, the crowd tapering off as we went, "I think your mother and and a few others would be hurt if they weren't invited."

I could swear he _wasn't _drunk. Would have bet on it. It was like back when we were training for the Quell, but this time he wasn't sour and pissed off. And he was right, I hadn't thought of my mother, the Hawthornes, Annie and little Finn, Pollux, even Effie... they'd be hurt that we didn't think of them. Happy for us I was certain, and absolutely understanding, but disappointed. No, I wouldn't disappoint anyone else with my usual behavior. I wouldn't disappoint Prim... she would have loved this day. She would have loved having Peeta in our family. Gale would be proud of the person I now chose to be. Gale... _my envelope!_

"The envelope!" I stopped dead in my tracks. Peeta's forward momentum didn't stop in time and his hand yanked me forward, thankfully his arms caught me before I could fall.

"RIght here, Miss... er, Mrs. Mellark." Lem had the envelope tucked into his jacket, he held it out for me.

My heart thudded with relief. "Thank you," I breathed. Peeta raised an eyebrow, and I returned with a look that said _I'll explain later_.

Haymitch bid us good evening with a knowing wink, and Peeta blushed bright red. Lem and Sedge secured our home as they did every day around this time, and offered their polite congratulations. We closed and locked our front door and turned to each other. I was in his arms, and he in mine, instantly, our lips greedily crashing together. When we broke, hardly sated, it was only in need of air.

"Now what?" Peeta asked expectantly.

"Now..." I panted, "... aren't we supposed to have a toasting?"

He laughed lightly, brushing a lock of wavy hair behind my ear and pulling out the dandelion that he'd accidentally crushed in our fervent make-out session. He laid it on top of the envelope I'd placed on the entry table, next to our marriage certificate. "If you've taught me anything, it's that you rarely do what's expected. So yes, traditionally we would toast now... but what would you like to do?"

I sighed, thoughtfully. "Tradition would be good for me right now. I mean, for us." I rocked forward onto my toes and pecked him chastely on the lips.

Peeta grinned, my favorite, crooked smile. "One toasting, coming right up." He reluctantly let go of my hand and went to the kitchen, and I retreated to the living room, slipping off my hunting jacket. _Did I just get married in this? _Effie would be appalled. I grinned mischievously at the thought and set about lighting a fire in the stone hearth. Kicking off my boots, I tossed them and my socks in the corner, sitting on the floor in front of the fire and rubbing the bottoms of my feet back and forth over the soft carpet. I wondered how I should feel in this moment, just before sealing myself in spirit and love to this man who had become my sweet friend and confidant, and shook off the thought of meeting anyone's expectation. I'd feel however the heck I wanted to feel, and not how I was dictated by society or medical professional to feel. And I felt... well, good. I felt sound, and sure, and... whole. That was impossible; there were too many dear people missing from my life for me to feel whole. But I still felt it, and then something crossed my mind. They were all here with me, in my mind, in my memory. In the bushes lining the front of our house, in my bow, my jacket, the chair I now leaned against, in the book tucked safely in a chest in our bedroom, and in the letter I'd left by the door. They were all here beside me, around me, filling me up. And now I'd fill Peeta with all this love I'd been so selflessly given, to guard him against the darkness.

"Katniss?" his soft voice broke me from my epiphany. He knelt beside me, balancing a small loaf and serrated knife carefully on a wooden bread board. His calm eyes searched mine. "Is everything all right?"

I smiled warmly, genuinely. "It is now."

He lowered his eyes bashfully, then became serious. "I've made one of these every morning, since we came home," he gulped, setting the board before me and carefully slicing the bread. "I wasn't sure when or even if you'd ever be ready, but I made them anyway, always hoping. I wanted to make that connection to the first time, when I tossed you the bread from my family's store during that awful season years ago," he continued. The first slice fell to its side, and then I saw; it was the same fruit and nut bread that had saved my little family when there was nothing else. My heart fluttered at the kindness of this gesture. He'd remembered, after all this time and through all the things that had been done to make him forget. "I want you to know," he vowed, breaking the slice in half and holding it near the flames, "that I'll always take care of you, I'll always be here for you, and..." he pulled his hand away from the flames, "I'll always love you."

He held the bread to my mouth with pink fingers, and I bit into it, closing my eyes. In an instant, I saw my mother and sister, gratefully eating the same bread around our small kitchen table, back in the Seam house. My sister's eyes looked to mine, and she flashed me her fair, dimpled grin. I hadn't let her down then, and I would never again. When I opened my eyes on the present, Peeta wore a sad smile. He knew where I'd been, and was ever so patiently awaiting my return. He speared the other half of the bread on a fireplace skewer and held it out for me. Of course, he would singe his fingers, but wouldn't allow me to do the same. I held the second piece to the flames.

"Peeta, you know I'm never good at saying the right thing, but then you know me better than anyone. I've never met anyone as patient, kind, and loving as you are. I don't know what I did to get to keep you, but I wouldn't be me without you. I fished the slightly charred piece off the end of the skewer and held it to his lips. "I love you."

He chewed slowly, eyes never leaving mine. "You are mine... and I am yours," we recited together.

~Peeta~

A choked, half laugh, half sob, escaped my lips, and my eyes filled with tears. She pressed forward in that moment and covered my mouth with her own, both of us losing our balance and rolling onto our sides on the carpet, the rest of the bread forgotten. My fingers went straight to tangle in her hair, and my tongue ventured out to slide across her lower lip. I just couldn't help it. A delightful moan escaped her, and her tongue came to caress mine. I tried to be gentle, I just wanted her so badly. I forced myself to break away, continuing to kiss her cheeks, her forehead, the tip of her nose, along her jaw, and down her neck to the hollow where her collarbones met, a delicious little spot my lips had never touched. It was so soft, so delicate. Her pulse beat madly against my lips, and suddenly her fingers were fumbling down the front of my shirt, shakily pulling at the buttons. I moved back up to kiss her, smiling against her lips.

"Maybe we should go upstairs," I whispered, as my shirt fell open. She burrowed into my chest and nodded. Kissing the top of her head, I got unsteadily to my feet, and when she moved to do the same, I swept her up into my arms. Her eyes were wide with surprise and they didn't leave mine, not for an instant. To this day, I have no idea how we made it up the stairs safely, our eyes locked and my legs shaking, but we managed.

I thought I knew her great and subtle nature from the time I was five. From sixteen, I thought I knew her true beauty. But I knew neither before this night; had no idea her subtle power and quiet grace as our bodies met and eternity was whittled down to nothing at all, not in comparison to my brave, beautiful wife. I couldn't hold her close enough, couldn't feel enough of her to satisfy me. She wanted far more of me than I could give. It would take a lifetime to begin to fill this need for her, to shape this primal sketch of her want of me. The pain I dreaded bringing upon her was soon forgotten, and all that was left was her, holding fast to me, whispering desires and dreams and great nothings that mattered to no one but us. And after, when we rested in blissful, boneless embrace, I realized finally... I hadn't just made her mine. She'd made me hers.

The darkness was electrifying. My senses snapped to full and immediate attention, something they'd never done before upon waking, not at this level of insistence. I blew out a sharp breath to adjust. Being with her last night... I didn't have words for what we did. What we achieved. Never in my life had I felt so intensely, utterly in need, and the one person who could relieve this longing, the last person who would have wanted to so many years ago, moved a mountain to be with me. For one brief instant, as our world came apart, we shared a soul. She gave more of herself than she'd given anyone ever before, she'd whispered to me.

I felt past my clutch on a pillow... it smelled like her hair... to her side of the bed. Empty. Barely any warmth left, either. My pulse fretted. _She's probably just downstairs_, my rational side told the other. Maybe she was hungry, we weren't exactly interested in having a proper supper last night. I smiled briefly at the remembrance, and then my more erratic side threw a snide remark, one that hauled me out of bed in an instant. I fumbled with a pair of sleep pants, yanking them up over my legs. _What if she... oh no... she thought this was a mistake! She doesn't want me... she used me! No... _I squeezed my eyes shut. _She would not do that. Even if she was having second thoughts, we promised to talk through things. She promised me she'd stay, even if she thought the alternative was better for me._ But it didn't matter what I told myself. My fear of losing her- the one thing that scared me more than flipping out in the throes of a tremor- was trumping anything rational my brain could conjure up.

I heard something fall downstairs, just a light clatter, and I heaved a sigh of relief. _See? I told you she was just hungry,_ I told Meltdown Peeta. I cracked the bedroom door as a muffled female voice drifted up the stairs.

It didn't belong to Katniss.


	15. Chapter 14 & Epilogue

**Chapter 14**

~Katniss~

I was one of those girls.

Those girls who lie awake reminiscing about their first time, how it was so much more or less perfect than they'd thought it would be... I was doing that. But I was having a hard time calling what we did 'perfect', when what we shared was so different than what could be qualified by as simple a word. No, it _was _perfect... for us. It was... beautiful, and terrifying, and empowering, and humbling, and... everything. Just as Peeta was to me. All those things, and everything other nameless word that could describe how... completely _loved_... I felt.

Now I could flip out. _I, Katniss Ever-_ no, I'd never be her again. She was part of the past, a past I had just hours before promised myself I'd release my grip on. I wasn't going to allow a relapse into the sullen, unreachable persona. Ever. Distraction over, I continued my thought. _I, Katniss Mellark, did not have the sense to take a particular precaution. Of course I know how the body works, but In loving my husband, I may have inadvertently accomplished what I promised myself, and him, could never be permitted to happen. _I needed to get out of this bed before I woke him with my silent ranting; Peeta was remarkably sensitive to unspoken tension, even in his sleep. I slid out from under his arm and slipped the warm pillow from behind my head into his hold. The top drawer was already open, so I retrieved whatever clothing would make the least noise. I pulled on the sleep shorts and clingy gray shirt and pulled the bedroom door behind me. It closed with the softest click.

These houses were made to stand the test of time, and so the stairs never squeaked, no fittings had loosened, no maintenance had been required in three years, and considering the decades the house stood empty and settling on their respective foundations, this was craftsmanship to be celebrated. This aside, I had a terrifying problem, or might have one, and I certainly wasn't celebrating.

I spent a few minutes pacing the dim kitchen, the low light from the dying stove fire coupled with the waning moon barely illuminating the room, and deciding whether to try my mother's number... she didn't sleep much anymore and there was a possibility she'd be awake at this hour. But then I'd have to tell her about yesterday, and... no, I wanted Peeta holding my hand when I made that call. Better yet, the new, forgiving Katniss wanted her to learn our news in person. But then... the clinic. Of course, they had to have something that could test me. And then, help me figure out how... if...

I leaned back against the counter in frustration. My back knocked a precariously-placed container into the sink with a clatter. I froze, listening for stirring upstairs.

"I've never seen the Mockingjay this edgy," a low, amused voice projected from the living room. I knew that voice. A shadowy form rose from my father's chair and ghosted into view.

Layne Paylor was much thinner than I remember. Wisps of dark hair escaped the tight bun she always wore, and her eyes were shifty, hungry. She wore her rebel soldier attire, wrinkled and torn in places, and dirty, as though she'd walked through dust and bramble all the way from the Capitol. "I'm not here to hurt you, Katniss. I want to talk." Her voice was smooth, controlled, with a thin, sharp edge of sadness and pleading. Her left hand rested below her hip, her right outstretched, palm up, toward me.

Training with the soldiers in Thirteen, I knew it was standard protocol to carry a holstered blade at the small of the back, concealed, and tipped toward the dominant hand. You could usually see the outline through the uniform shirt. Most tipped to the right.

Paylor's, however, tipped to the left.

I reached behind me, retrieving something long and sharp from the sink, shuddering at the noise the fallen container made in my fumbling.

"I see you're still quicker than the rest," she relaxed her façade. "Take your time, I'd actually prefer a fair fight from you." Paylor's mouth curled into a smile, her politician's smile. The dark, beady eyes held me where I stood. The handle I gripped was wet; it was one of Peeta's bread knives, but it would do.

"Why?" I breathed. It was the only word of an infinite number of thoughts that I was able to produce in sound. And appropriately, it summed up every question to which I needed an answer.

Paylor laughed lightly, so identical to the rebel leader I'd come to know. I had to give her credit; she'd fooled even me. "Is that, 'Why are you here?', or more of a 'Why aren't my guards here to protect me?', or maybe even..." her words dripped venom... "'Why didn't you just kill us while we slept?'"

I let the last one sink in. If she was here and able to subdue the ever-watchful Lem and Sedge, she could have, of course, done that. Why drag this out? My confused hesitation prodded her forward.

"Not exactly sure why I'm here, eh?" Paylor tilted her head to the side, sizing me up, attempting me to distract from her "I thought it would be obvious. Maybe you're not so quick after all." She rocked her weight to one foot and counted on her right fingers, her left hand still planted lightly at her hip. "Let's see... first, you get your dear old buddy the Captain to go digging into my past, like it's anybody's business. Then you set most of the old crowd after me; I have to tell you, sending your precious fellow Victors to do your dirty work was a nice touch, all while trying to keep me from knowing you were pulling the strings. And after everything I've done for this country... do you think that was very nice of you?" Paylor had never struck me as condescending. I wasn't so sure I'd known her at all, and that would be a huge disadvantage. If she was able to hide the truth so well, and from so many who should have seen, then I hadn't ever truly seen the extent of her already superior tactical ability. I barely suppressed the urge to shudder, fighting to keep my face even, maybe a little confused. I was rapidly becoming less sure of my ability to win if this came to blows. I wanted my bow. My own knife, even. But I had nothing but a worn-out bread cutter.

Paylor's face shifted from superiority to malice. "You _ruined_ me!" she spat. "You and your pathetic, damaged pet, he's the best protection you have, isn't he? All that pent up lust for you, and with all that venom they gave him, he's the perfect mutt bodyguard! And after all you did to him, he still wants you... and your cronies call me manipulative?" her eyes shifted, barely in focus, but razor sharp. Her lips trembled with rage. "You know what you deserve? I'll tell you. When I finish you, and I _promise _it will be slow, I'm going to leave your corpse for him to find, and your blood on his fingers. No punishment could be sweeter for the two of you... a situation you finally have no hope of surviving, and he has to live with your death on his hands. The Games are over. I win," she cackled softly, "and you lose."

I had to speak, or _do_... something. I had to draw this out, talk her down or subdue her, and I had serious doubts about my ability to do either. But I had to do something, anything. I couldn't let her hurt Peeta. If anyone was going to hurt him, it would have to be me. _If I can't take her down, maybe... I can take her with me. _My eyes reactively widened a bit at this realization. That was it. It could be the only way. He couldn't be allowed to think he'd hurt me. He had to know it was her. It was the only way for him to remember, always, that I loved him.

"The wheels are turning now, are they?" Paylor snickered. Evil didn't even apply to the words describing her face, her voice, the way she trembled with her hatred. She took another small step forward, passing the threshold into the kitchen.

I gulped. The window on my only opportunity for what I could barely call a victory was rapidly closing. "I... I have to know..." I stumbled, "Would you have brought back the Games?"

She barked a laugh at this, truly amused. That's when I saw Peeta.

The blond hair over his forehead, an eye, shrouded in darkness so I couldn't see the color, peering around the corner. He had to be standing on the bottom step, just two short feet from Paylor. He'd never moved so quietly. Not in his life, I would have wagered.

Paylor was too entertained at my question to notice my eyes flit away for the second it took to notice him. "Of course not, "I'm not stupid," she insisted. "_Those _Games had run their course decades ago. I had... more entertaining plans. But you took that from me. You took everything! I deserved this! Me! It was my turn! My turn!" Her anger was immeasurable, her rant escalating in volume and unmatched in intensity. She shifted her weight to the other foot, and peripherally, I could see Peeta taking advantage of every sound and movement to slowly creep out from behind the wall. Something in his hand glinted, reflecting the light from the stove fire.

My hunting knife.

"Wha-" Paylor squeaked, her left hand on her blade, spinning to face the source of the orange flash, her right arm already blocking his attack. I dashed forward, plunging the knife from my hand into her back, the sickening crunch of the serrated edge contacting against her ribs. Her body stiffened, bracing, and then fell back into me. I shifted aside and let her fall to the floor. Her own knife had left her hand.

"Katniss..." Peeta's eyes met mine, I could see them now. The irises were rapidly contracting. His hands grasped at his side, and his knees buckled. My body turned to ice.

_No no no no nonono..._

Blood. It trickled down his pale skin, catching at the hem of his pants, soaking in, turning the gray fibers to rust. I didn't remember moving, but I caught him as he fell, with strength I didn't know I had, lowering him to the ground. The blood began to pool on the floor at his back. "Katniss..." he choked. "What... did I just do..."

"Shh, you'll be fine. You had a tremor, everything's fine, you'll be fine..." my stomach clenched, breaking up the words.

"She... she..." he mumbled, eyes struggling to stay locked on mine, but fluttering.

This wasn't happening. He couldn't leave me, not now. Not after everything. A low keening bubbled up inside me and spilled over until the insides of my skull were sure to crack. It took mere seconds to realize the sound was real, and it was coming from me.

A bloody hand touched my cheek. "Kat-niss... love you... al-ways..."

"No! Peeta, Peeta please, please stay with me, please!" I wailed. The world was slipping away, the air being sucked from my lungs, the blood from my heart, the soul from my body. And still I screamed. Hands pulled me away. Held me down, kept me from him. Took me somewhere else, wrapped me up. Light was brighter. Voices, none that mattered. I saw the stars, the blackness, it swallowed me whole. Tightness bound me, kept me from moving, from struggling. A sharp pain in my gut stabbed me, over and over. I wanted to dig a hole and bury myself alive. Somewhere no one would find me. So I could join him.

"_Hey, Catnip._"

"He's gone, Gale..." The words fell out of my mouth like vomit, I couldn't hold them back. He was hovering, perched on a bag of flour. I was back in the cellar, the old quilt pulled over me.

"_And what if he is._" His eyes were sympathetic, but firm as their steely color.

"Then I want to be gone, too." There was no hesitation.

Gale shifted. "_And what if he isn't._"

"He is. I saw."

"_You assume rather quickly._"

"I _saw_. He died protecting me. Like always." Like always. Like... _Always_.

"_He's stronger than you gave him credit for. And more worthy than I did._"

"He's gone." _Gone. Gone, gone, gone gone gonegonegone..._

"_Katniss._"

A small, pale, delicate hand touched my face. I would know this hand, anywhere.

"Prim?" my voice quivered.

Her dimpled grin, those sparkling blue eyes. She laughed. "_Don't be sad, Katniss. And don't give up. Don't ever. For me, please? So many people love you_."

My face crumpled. "But he's gone, Prim. He's gone. I need him and he's gone." The little puff-sleeved arms pulled me in, settling my head in her lap. Tender fingers stroked my hair.

"_Shh. You were right, I do love my new brother,_" she whispered. "_But... you get to keep him a while longer._"

My heart stuttered, the abyss of despair ejecting me. I met her eyes again. So many things I wanted to say, to tell her, and I couldn't find the words. She leaned in to kiss my cheek, and then she was gone.

The tightness returned, or maybe, I was just aware of it again. I was bound and warm, too warm... the smell of blood and antiseptic hung in my nostrils. It hadn't been a dream. My eyes were sealed shut. I pressed out weakly, trembling, with my arms, my elbows, my legs were curled, knees below my chin.

"Settle down, Sweetheart." Haymitch. Great. "Seriously, I'll have them sedate you again," he barked softly when I didn't comply.

"Tell me," I mumbled.

"Huh?"

"Tell me... tell me tell me tellmetellme_tellme_!" my volume increased on each word until I was shrieking.

"Your boy's okay, Sweetheart."

My struggling slowed, like I'd been plunged in tar. My eyelids finally cracked. The gruff old man, hazy in my view, had me wrapped in a heavy blanket and curled in his lap, pulled against his chest. I was suddenly aware of my weakness. If he hadn't been holding me, I was sure I'd have fallen to the floor. "Peeta..." I muttered softly.

"C'mere," he shifted, and slowly stood, keeping me pinned to him. My legs unfolded, and he carried me a few steps, then placed me gingerly on my side. I was still wrapped, but the blanket fell away from my shoulders. "Be careful, they had to operate on him."

Peeta's pale form shifted, flickered before my unsteady eyes. He was still here. Tubed and taped, tethered to lifegiving technology, but he was here; machines, clicking and beeping softly, guarding over him. I felt Haymitch raise the bed railing behind me. My brain was so foggy... my free arm wobbled when I tried to lift it; I wanted to reach out, to hold my husband, but I wasn't getting anywhere. Haymitch must have sensed my difficulty, and reached over me to help settle my arm across Peeta's chest.

"Thank you..." I murmured.

Haymitch snorted. "Like I said, be careful with him."

His shadow moved away and chair legs creaked. A sigh, and then, silence.

Peeta's chest rose and fell under my arm. My vision twitched spastically. I'd been sedated before, this was nothing new or different, but the weakness never ceased to be frightening. I had only a small amout of control over my body, but just enough to brush my thumb back and forth over his thinly garbed shoulder. Suddenly, my breaths weren't enough to fill me, and my chest contracted. It took a moment to realize I was crying.

And I didn't know why.

Peeta was alive, in my arms, he would survive this. He hadn't left me; I got to keep him. Paylor would never, ever hurt anyone again. She could never take what I'd fought so hard to protect. I'd just seen my sister, or at least, my mind had briefly brought her back to me, and I was comforted by the miniscule contact. I had nothing to cry about. I had everything. For once, nothing was being taken from me.

"Nice... to see you... too." Peeta's face was turned toward mine, his eyelids low, dark circles beneath, but a tiny smile on his lips.

"Peeta... so sorry... so sorry..." I sobbed, slurring every word.

He chuckled lightly, then winced. "They drugged you too, huh? S'okay. M'fine." His tubed hand came up to rest on my arm. "Don't cry. You'll make me cry, and it'll hurt."

What a sight we must have been when the nurse came in. She just smiled, took Peeta's vitals while I lay there like a slug, even took my pulse for good measure. I guessed Peeta had been awake earlier, this all seemed routine to him.

"Thank you," he said to her after she adjusted his IV drip. I knew the feeling well, a surge of pain relief that could make your eyes roll back. He must have been tolerating quite a bit of discomfort, but hid it from me, of course. I wanted to cry again but thought better of it, pushing the feeling down into my gut.

"You two should sleep," the nurse suggested, patting the hand that rested on Peeta's shoulder. He nodded, his willingness dragging me down with him. The last thing I felt before unconsciousness claimed us both was his soft breath in my hair.

Clarity. It was always overwhelming after drugged slumber, everything was brighter, more crisp. More headache-worthy, like a hangover. I had control of my limbs again. Peeta snored lightly, the tubes in his nose askew. I brushed a few shaggy blond locks from his forehead. He didn't stir. He looked so peaceful, moreso than I'd ever seen him. I pressed my lips to his cheek.

I no longer felt the railing at my back; they had pushed another bed up against Peeta's to catch me if I rolled over. I was touched by this act of thoughtfulness, and thankful, because I needed to get up. I slowly extricated myself from the heavy blanket, being careful not to disturb Peeta. The tiles were cool under my feet. Haymitch's chair was empty, but there was a stack of clothes in his place, some of our own clothes, in fact. I changed, keeping my eyes on the door so I could cover up quickly if someone came. Peeta slept on, they must have kept a sedative in his IV. I knew he might be put off about it later, but right now, he was resting, and that's what mattered. I kissed him again, silently promising not to be gone long. The clinic, or any hospital room for that matter, was too confining. I needed air.

I nearly missed the familiar form standing guard outside the door. His arm hung in a sling, his face drawn.

"Lem? Oh thank goodness. Are you all right? What happened?" I mentally berated myself for the rush of questions.

"I'm... so sorry, Ma'am. I should have seen her coming. I wasn't diligent enough. We were... overpowered. I'm so sorry we couldn't protect you." Failure was so hard for a man like Lem to admit. His mouth opened and closed like there was more.

I shook my head. "I'm sure if you could have done something, you would have," I reassured him. "Where's Sedge?"

His eyes fell, and he shook his head. A ball of ice dropped into my stomach. "I'm so sorry..." was all I could say. We stood there a minute, in honorable silence. I brought my hand to his good shoulder. "We can't tell Peeta. The guilt would be too much for him."

Lem nodded. "Yes, Ma'am, that's what Mr. Abernathy said as well." He sighed back whatever emotions threatened to surface. "Mr. Weaver has recalled me, I leave in a few hours. You should tell Mr. Mellark the three of us were recalled together. And please give him my best."

"I will." I rose on my tiptoes and pressed a kiss to his cheek. "Thank you, for everything."

He gave a small, respectful bow, and turned to leave. I never saw him again.

I dashed to the back door of the clinic and had to grab the handle for support. Taking off like that after coming off a sedation usually brought on a bout of dizziness and nausea, rather unwelcome considering I wasn't sure what time it was or how long it had been since the last time I ate, and then it dawned on me that the last time was at our toasting. It felt like ages ago. I took several long, slow breaths and pushed the heavy door open.

It was late, or early enough, that the stars were out. The moon was full now. _So it's only been a day, _I thought, leaning on the railing. The cool, mid-fall air was still and familiar, sweet with the scent of dying foliage, calming. I'd only stay a minute, I had to get back to Peeta, but I felt better having gotten outside. _I won't dwell. I won't. What happened, happened. No one could have known it would happen this way. Peeta's going to be all right. She won't hurt anyone else. She can't hurt anyone else..._

"Gonna make sense anytime, Sweetheart?"

My head whipped around. Haymitch leaned against a roof support in the shadows, dangling his legs over the side of the platform. And not surprisingly, he had a bottle in one hand. Something made me go sit next to him.

"See Lem?" he asked me. I nodded. "We in agreement?" I nodded again. He turned the bottle over in his hand. It had just occurred to me that it was still unopened.

"I won't lie to him. You'll have to. He wouldn't believe me anyway." My stomach soured at our plotting. This was exactly the kind of thing I swore I'd never again do to anyone, Peeta least of all. Haymitch tipped his head in assent. "I mean it, Haymitch. This is the one thing I'll keep from him and nothing else." I shook my head. "I wish I didn't know."

Haymitch considered the bottle, but anyone who knew him could tell his mind was on other things. "He tell you what happened?"

I shook my head. "Not sure I want to know that, either." I wiggled my toes. They felt stiff against the cold concrete. "What about Paylor? What are they saying?"

"Unofficially, a clean-up crew took her body and is sending it to be buried in some remote part of the desert. Can't tell from looking at your kitchen that anything ever happened there. And.. the official word is that she came after you, and you killed her in the struggle."

"But, that's pretty much what actually happened," I said, stating the obvious. "Isn't the official word usually something more... politically correct?"

Haymitch snickered. "I think the public is tired of all the political nonsense."

I couldn't agree with that assessment more. "What about the District? What do they know?"

"The same story. Everyone's pretty shaken up, going from a high to a low so quick like that. A bunch set up a vigil on the front steps... bet you're glad you came out the back." He adjusted, setting his bottle down. "Don't get any ideas... party's still on. Least, Sae says it is."

"She hasn't been around much... did we do something?"

"Nah, she's still embarrassed about the last time you were in here, she thinks she made things worse between you. That woman's got a great heart, but no tact. Kinda like yours truly." He groaned, getting to his feet. He held his hand out.

"C'mon. Wanna show you something."

The clinic was a newer building, completed just a few months after we returned home the first time, so the walls were still fresh, the fixtures new and shiny, and the equipment updated, if not the best of its kind. There were only two floors, but it was more than enough to accomodate the district, and was a welcome relief after having no real medical staff on hand and watching my mother and sister deal with some of the most gruesome cases on our kitchen table.

Haymitch stopped at the end of a corridor and took my shoulders to turn me to face the next one. An opaque plastic tarp hung from ceiling to floor, waving from the air vent pointed in the general direction. This distracted me only for a second, from the temporary sign taped off to one side.

FUTURE HOME OF THE PRIMROSE WARD, CENTER FOR EXCELLENCE IN CHILDREN'S HEALTH

DEDICATED BY THE HAWTHORNE FOUNDATION

A rush of emotion flooded me, displacing the strength to stand. I fell to my knees, the strong hands on my shoulders easing the way down. The air wouldn't come, my lungs wouldn't expand. _'All I can do now is to make sure her loss will be remembered, and that it won't have been in vain.'_ Those had been his words. And I had no words to describe... whatever I was feeling. Whatever it was, I hadn't quite felt anything like it.

I must have remembered how to breathe. Haymitch was patient, if he had any remarks, he kept them to himself. "How? When?" I blubbered, hoping he knew what I meant.

"Well, I suppose they were paying him enough, 'cause I got wind he was starting some kind of charity to get kids access to doctors even if they can't pay. And _when_... heck, I dunno. But they're building one of these in every hospital in every district, so I imagine it's been in the works for some time."

"He never told me."

"Would you have let him?" He must not have expected an answer, for he pulled me to my feet and led me stumbling back toward Peeta's room in a daze. _Why didn't he just tell me? Why did he have to be so damn cryptic? _The answer was obvious, of course. Gale wasn't the bragging type. Fiery, yes, generous with his family, but reserved with everyone else. But Prim... yes, he regarded us as family. So in essence, he was taking care of us, once again. Making sure she was remembered, and making sure I'd remember that he'd loved her, too. Something inadvertently occurred to me.

"Haymitch, you go check on Peeta... I have to... I have to do something."

He looked at me funny, then released my arm. "What should I tell him?"

I grinned. "That I love him."

His face went from concerned to grossed out in a second flat. "I will do no such thing," he scoffed. He crossed his arms and watched me walk away.

To say I was scared was an understatement. The relief at remembering that I'd needed to do this was fleeting as the anxiety of my predicament took hold. But there was a sudden conflict that plucked at my heartstrings. It was tiny, so small that I couldn't even call it deviation from my resolve, but it was there. A _what if_, of sorts. I couldn't ask just anyone for help. Heck, I didn't want to ask anyone. But this was better than many alternatives, I was sure.

Simm looked up from a mess of papers when I knocked on the doorframe. "Katniss! Please come in, or do you prefer Mrs. Mellark now? Don't mind the mess." He rose, indicating to the chair across from his desk. I clicked the office door shut behind me.

"Katniss is fine, Mrs. Mellark makes me sound like Peeta's mother," I said nervously. I shook off the thought of that terrible woman, and my rambling.

"Of course," he nodded. "I hear Peeta is doing much better. So what can I do for you?"

I opened and closed my mouth a few times. It was so hard to say, so personal and humiliating. I gulped and steeled myself. "Can I trust you to keep something to yourself?" My voice made me sound very small.

"Naturally," Simm stated, professionally. "It's part of our highest moral code to keep all medical information private. Is anything wrong?"

"Not exactly. Well, I don't know if it is... or not..."

"Are you feeling all right?"

"I feel fine. It's just..." Why was it so hard to ask?

"Do you need a test of some kind?" he guessed.

"Uh... I think so."

He smiled, knowingly. "I'll be right back."

I heaved a sigh. My bare foot bounced, sending vibrations up my leg, up my spine. He hadn't been gone more than a minute, but it was a very, very long minute.

He pulled his chair up to mine. "Press your finger here." He held up a sleek, gray device with a small screen and a round receptor. I placed my finger over the round part, and it poked me. They used something similar at registration for the Reapings, I remembered. I voiced the passing thought.

"Yes, it isn't very reassuring, is it?" he wrinkled his nose, then the box beeped. "Well, there you have it. Negative." He turned the box for me to see. "Should I offer my condolences or congratuations?"

The corners of my mouth turned up in sheer relief. A sigh escaped me.

"Congratulations, then. In which case, I have a number of preventatives, if you're interested."

I left his office with a pocketful of sample tablets.

Peeta was just rousing when I entered his room. "Out, Haymitch." I held the door open.

"Feisty's back," the older man laughed, pushing himself up out of his chair. "You be nice, Sweetheart," he patted my shoulder. I clicked the door shut behind him.

"Katniss?" Peeta looked confused at my none-too-subtle entrance. He held his hand out to me. I blew out the breath I was holding. I rounded to the other side of the bed, where the extra space was, and climbed back in. Peeta weakly tucked me into his good side, and I reached up to absently comb his hair with my fingertips. His free hand plucked the oxygen tubes from his nose and let them fall unceremoniously over the bed rail.

"Feeling better?" I asked. My expression must have been more pleasant than I thought, for he smiled and held me a little closer.

"Yeah. Moreso now that you're here." He laughed a little, leading to a cough and then a wince, then another smile. I just rode it out with him; he wouldn't have liked me to fuss. If the pain was unmanageable, he'd let me know. "Are _you _all right?" Of course, he worried more about me than himself.

I nodded. "Just relieved you're still with me."

"I'll never leave you. Ever," he vowed, pressing his lips to my temple. "Tell me what happened," he said, a little offhandedly. He was trying to keep things light. I knew this as code for 'just the essentials', that he was shaky on the reality, and responded in kind.

"She cornered me," my voice was low and even. "You snuck up on her with my hunting knife. She saw the blade's reflection off the wall behind me, disarmed and stabbed you, and I killed her. You didn't do anything wrong. You didn't hurt anyone," I reassured him.

He nodded, but the warring relief and regret within him was palpable. "I was so afraid _I'd _done it, even more that I'd hurt you. When I woke up and saw Haymitch holding you, I was so relieved. He said... that you wouldn't let go of me... that it took three people to pull you away. He made me promise not to tell you... sorry for this Haymitch... that he gave the order to have you knocked out. He was real worried about you. About us." Peeta sighed. "That man truly cares. More than we'll ever know, I think."

"Peeta, can we talk about something else?" the words rushed from my mouth. Not that I wasn't... touched, at the old mentor's soft interior, but the nagging from earlier was still in mind. I felt the packets crinkle in my pocket between my hip and the mattress.

"Sure, of course."

I forced myself to relax, to resist tensing at these thoughts, to avoid clamming up. "I really, really want to talk about this with you. I hope it doesn't cause a fight; you deserve to know how I feel about things, even when my feelings change. Please, please try not to be mad, okay?"

"You can tell me anything, Katniss. I love you," he reassured me.

"I love you too." I placed a soft kiss on his cheek. "More than you know, I'm sure."

"I know you do, love. Tell me what's on your mind."

I sighed. "I can't think what might have happened differently if I'd not gone downstairs that night... but that's not the point. I got out of bed because I was afraid." My words came more and more quickly, and I struggled to stay calm. I needed to be rational if he was to understand. "Not of you, and not of what happened between us. It was... beautiful, and amazing, and so much more than I have words for... but I didn't think to... to use anything." I let the words sink in.

His eyes lowered. "_Oh_. I... I didn't, either." Another struggle welled up in him, this time between bitter longing and deepest regret. "I'm so sorry, Katniss. I wasn't thinking."

"Don't you dare blame yourself, Peeta." The soft, subtle force of my words brought his eyes to meet mine. "It's... it's okay. I just made certain that nothing... had resulted. And I have... assurances, that it won't in the future, unless we choose to."

He nodded, eyes a little conflicted. "If there are any steps I can take as well, I hope you'll let me," he began. "But you don't have to be afraid of the words, Katniss. They won't turn me into a lovesick mess." He sighed, considering. "I do have this... _desire_, within me... to make a baby with you. To have a family with you one day, if you were willing. And please be assured, I won't ever, ever ask you to fulfill that need unless you absolutely wanted it too. After what just happened, I think maybe you're right. Maybe things are too unstable. I'm certain that _I'm_ too unstable. If my meds can't prevent me from wielding knives in our own home..."

"You were protecting me, Peeta."

"Was I?" he shook his head slowly. "Something inside me wanted me to kill her. Like I was programmed to do it, some sick side-show planned for Snow's illegitimate child. Maybe he saw all this coming, used me to... to get rid of her. How a father can do that to his own child..." he shook his head, pain entering his voice. "I didn't know it was there, I don't know what triggered it; I'd seen her tons in Thirteen and then on television, and I felt nothing then. What if there are others, just waiting for a trigger to make me snap? If we had a child together and I..." his breath hitched. "I'd never forgive myself." He took a few breaths to calm himself. "It's just something I can never have. They would never be safe." Peeta sniffled. "As long as I have you, I think I'll be okay with that."

"I won't..." I muttered.

"What?"

I shook my head. "This is... all kinds of messed up." Peeta's arm tightened around me. "I feel so, so guilty. When I thought I could be... pregnant," I forced myself to acknowledge the word, if only in a whisper, "I was terrified. But then I thought I'd lost you, and suddenly, I wished I was. Like I wanted there to be something of you I could keep after you were gone. It was horrible and selfish, and after I knew you were all right, I went back to being afraid." My face crinkled, my resolve breaking. "I'm a terrible person."

"No, Katniss... shh..." he soothed, stroking my hair. "It was only natural for you to feel that way. It's all right." He let me cry, held me like the good husband that he was. "I think... maybe we should back-burner this conversation for a few years. See how we feel about it after some time has passed, hmm? It's nothing we need to worry over right now. But I'm glad you told me how you feel. Please don't ever stop doing that, okay?"

I nodded into his shoulder. I told him about Gale's gift, and his letter. The gentle soul I'd married teared up a little, so blissfully grateful to my best friend, for leaving something so profound in memory of my sister.

When Peeta lulled into a morning nap, I went to find a phone. The public ones lined a busy hallway, and I stared at them for a minute, then thought better of making a private conversation fodder for public consumption. One of the nurses took pity on my roaming around and let me use a vacant office, and I wondered sadly if he would have afforded the convenience to just anyone. My fingers trembled as they dialed.

"Hello?"

I swallowed. "M... Mom?" I didn't remember a time I'd sounded more timid. I mentally kicked myself.

"Katniss? Oh thank goodness." I heard an audible sigh. "I've been calling everyone I can think of, no one would tell me anything. Are you all right? Is Peeta all right?"

"We're fine, Mom." I paused. "How did you know?"

"It's all over the news, little one. I've been worried sick. Even when you called after that cryptic propo of Peeta's was aired, my stomach is still in knots. So is it true? Is she really..."

"She's gone."

Another sigh.

"Mom?"

"Yes, Katniss?"

"Peeta and I... we... we were married a few days ago."

Silence.

"Mom?"

"I... I'm happy for you, little one. Well, I guess you're not my little one anymore then, are you?" Her voice was sad, but peaceful. The latter was an undertone I hadn't heard in years, not since I was a child.

"There's going to be a party in a couple weeks, at the end of the harvest. Greasy Sae's idea. I'd... we'd like it if you came."

"I'd like that."

"Thank you, Mom." I paused. I did that a lot when it was my mother on the other end of the line. "I'm sorry I've been so distant the past few years. I'm really trying to work on that."

My mother sighed again. "Me too, little one. I spoke with Hazelle yesterday," her voice perked up a bit. "It seems the kids miss their home. They're arranging to move back to Twelve. They're excited to see you."

"Oh. I didn't know they were considering that. It will be nice to see them, too."

"I'm glad you called, Katniss."

I swallowed. "Me too, Mom."

"I have to hang up now, but Katniss?"

"Yes, Mom?"

"Do you think you can keep dire situations to a minimum from now on? My poor heart can't take much more."

"I'll try, Mom."

"I love you, Katniss."

"I... I love you too, Mom."

EPILOGUE

~Peeta~

I got to come home four days later. Haymitch and a few others held off the entourage of wellwishers. Katniss fought me on walking home, but in the end, she allowed it, but only because I resigned to letting her have full command of my recovery once we arrived. She held my hand and matched my snail's pace; I couldn't tell her how much it hurt, but I needed the walk. I needed to feel the pain, to move past what happened and to process all the things we'd opened up about. A walk is the best way to do that, and it couldn't have been a better trade than to have the woman I loved making the journey with me. My beautiful wife.

I existed now in a state of bliss that I'd never imagined possible until I was immersed in it. 'Katniss Mellark'... I couldn't stop thinking it. Well, I'd thought it plenty, thought it to death for years, but it's different when it's a reality. I couldn't have been more grateful for her endless presence at my side. The greatest gift, for her to love me in return... it was worth the wait.

A work crew was hard a work on my old house, preparing it for the Hawthorne's arrival. I'd called Hazelle after Katniss' conversation with her mother, and insisted they live next door. Katniss says I was being far too persuasive. I hoped I hadn't tread on any boundaries; it was just important to me to have Katniss' extended family closeby. The Village needed more children.

A familiar face greeted us from our porch when we reached the steps. "You two are looking well," the good Doc told us with a smile.

"Thank you for coming, Dr. Aurelius," I greeted him. It was a difficult minute getting up the stairs, but when I made it up I shook his hand. We talked for hours, or I did, actually; Katniss poked her head in once in a while until the good Doctor invited her to join us. He told of Weaver's resignation and voluntary submission for his role in bringing Paylor down, having taken full responsibility for the actions that may be construed as terrorism. He was set to be incarcerated indefinitely, a tragic hero. And we knew, Mr. Weaver would have it no other way.

In the weeks that followed, Katniss hunted, and I baked. The Hawthornes were a welcome sight in the yard nextdoor. Haymitch's geese visited, and on days Haymitch was able to will himself from utter stupefication, he'd come by to collect them, stopping for a meal, and sometimes a story.

Mrs. Everdeen arrived on the night before the harvest festival. Their reunion was bittersweet; Katniss cried for hours in our bed that night, but the way she clung to me when her tears ran dry told of heartfelt forgiveness. The love I saw in her mother's eyes when we came downstairs for breakfast in the morning stirred a longing in my heart. I was glad Katniss still had this chance.

We'd asked for the occasion that evening be held not for us, but in dedication of the hard work and unification of all who had contributed to the district's prosperity, and to honor those we had lost along the way. Our fellow citizens found ways to recognize us, however, much to Katniss's embarrassment. She bashfully consented to dance with me, and that was all I needed to make the starry night memorable.

The air got colder. Katniss and Rory took to the mountainside for what game hadn't yet settled in for the winter, bringing back plenty to share among our families. Hazelle and Vick prepared the pelts, and Posy discovered a talent for creating beautiful blankets from the fur pieces. I entertained the idea of having her help in the bakery come spring, and do some painting on the side; she would make a brilliant art tutor in a few seasons. Twelve's education system could use a fresh mind.

There were nights for both of us, when the dreams still trickled in. When the terrors and tears ended, we'd always talk about it. Just a few words here and there, feelings. We both knew the next step. I knew she was brave enough. And where I wasn't, she helped me. She always did.

"Peeta... we have to. We've put it off long enough," Katniss whispered.

I sighed, my heart clenching in my chest. "All right."

She waited for me, in front of the fire. I needed time, time to bring myself to get out of bed, time to pull on a shirt, time to clunk down the stairs, time to wrap my head around it. What I wanted to say, how I needed to say it. And what it should look like.

Katniss met my eyes, her loose curls blazing from the firelight in the hearth. She had the book in her lap. Our book. I took my time, pencils in hand, and sank down next to her.

"Are you ready?" she asked, her eyes searching mine.

I looked away from her briefly to the portrait over the mantle, a piece I'd done of Prim in the meadow among the summer dandelions. I'd insisted on its placement there. There were times I felt I knew Prim, from my wife's stories, from the sketches I'd done. The depiction of her, so central in our home, gave me strength to do the things that were hard, to forgive those who had wronged us, long enough to ensure they were remembered in writing. I returned my gaze to the face of my partner, my best friend, the other half of my heart, and offered a small, brave smile.

"Yeah." I took the book, opening it so I could draw on one side, and she could write on the other. "I think I am."


End file.
